


Walk the Line

by cantodelcolibri



Series: night is dark and day is light [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Background Relationships, Latino Jesse McCree, M/M, Mission Fic, Panic Attacks, Romance, Slow Burn, but translations r provided, jess y som y gabi seguido hablan español, mentions of past trauma, on indefinite hiatus lmao, も少し日本語, 島田兄弟のために
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-30
Updated: 2017-10-24
Packaged: 2018-08-11 23:34:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 17
Words: 167,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7911892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cantodelcolibri/pseuds/cantodelcolibri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Genji sought him out on a quiet night in Japan to offer a spot on the newly recalled Overwatch's roster, Hanzo knew to expect distrust and animosity from his teammates.  That much he deserved. What he didn't expect was a chance to redeem himself, to prove himself and earn the camaraderie of the man that had so ardently opposed of him at initiation. For McCree to ignore his past and offer a hand in friendship was nothing other than utter foolishness. But Hanzo soon learned foolishness was often found in the circulated air of Watchpoint Gibraltar.</p><p>A long-winded tale of how Hanzo Shimada sheds his demons and learns to let go of his pride, and how Jesse McCree learns to work past his fear and let someone in. </p><p>With Genji as the best wingman.</p><p> </p><p>  <i>-used to be "I Walk the Line" but im a nitpicky idiot and changed my mind 17 chaps later-</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Koinobori

**Author's Note:**

> hi  
> this used to be _I Walk the Line_ but i changed my mind 17 chapters in so just a heads up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See end notes for English translations, and if you're on pc and prefer to read kanji instead of romaji, hover over text

When he closes his eyes, he hears him.

_“Onī-chan!”_ [1]

When he closes his eyes, he sees him. The ghost of a five year old boy. All scraped knees and rosy cheeks, tugging an insect net free from a low hanging branch. Disturbing the careful topiary their father paid to keep perfect. They were children then, and he had cared little.

_“Onī-chan, mite miyo !”_ [2] Genji brandishes his net without ensuring that the bugs are securely trapped within. He beams, too excited to show off his catch to his older brother.

_“Abu-”_ [3] Hanzo’s warning is cut off by Genji’s scream as the bugs make their way out of their short-lived prison, landing squarely on his hair.

His green hair. They must have mistaken it for the tree branches. Wait, that wasn’t right. Why wasn’t that right?

He hears his own laughter, a younger version, as the cicadas nestle into Genji’s hair and Genji cries out for him to help and to stop laughing. Genji topples backwards as he looks up, up, and up, trying to dig the bugs out of his black hair. Hanzo, who is all of eight years old and already in training, moves swiftly to catch him before he hits the ground.

They would have landed neatly, if it wasn’t for Genji’s squirming and struggling out of his grasp to keep pawing at his hair. _“Tasukete! Onī-chan, tasukete! ”_ [4] They both topple onto the moist grass as Genji makes a spectacle of himself. Hanzo grabs him by the arms and shoves him off from on top of himself. Genji rolls off, still messing with his hair, only to have the skittish bugs continue to crawl over his hands and onto his ears to reach safer territory. His whining quickly begins to show the tell-tale signs of an oncoming cry, and so Hanzo sighs, rises to his knees, and motions to the ground directly in front of him.

_“Kichinto suwari nasai.”_ [5] he scolds softly, and Genji grumbles but obeys. He quickly crawls over to him, sits up, and tucks his legs beneath him to give a kneeling Hanzo better access to the top of his head. As he picks off the bugs one by one, Genji insists that they need to convince father to let them go out and look at the shrines in the surrounding neighborhood. Hanzo tells him that they already have one in the castle. Genji says that they need to visit the temple, because they would surely be handing out sweets today. Hanzo scratches his head fondly and tells him the cooks have already prepared _kashiwa-mochi_ for them in the kitchens. Genji says that he wants to see the koi banners flying high off the rooftops of the neighborhood. Hanzo flicks the last bug off his hair and lets the movement carry his arm higher, pointing at the four koi banners waving lazily in the wind on the highest _yagura_ of the castle.

_"Koinobori!"_ Genji’s exclamation is followed by a peal of laughter.  _"Koinobori utatte kudasai!”_ Genji shuffles around until he is sitting facing Hanzo. Hanzo knew exactly what song Genji wanted him to sing, and he had long since grown past the age where he was comfortable singing. [6]

_"Yada.”_ He shakes his head. [7]

_"Onegai! ”_ [8]

_"Yada!”_ Hanzo makes his voice firm. But Genji is looking up at him with his big green begging eyes, and Hanzo can’t deny him. He sighs. But it sounds forced and faked even to his own ears. Genji’s smile is bright and sunny, and he sits cross-legged in front of him, forearms up and hands at the ready to clap along.

Hanzo watched. He saw himself sitting properly, back straight, ever intent on setting an example for his younger brother. Genji’s back was only ramrod straight because he was listening so intently. The moment seemed to be frozen, waiting for the ghost of himself to swallow a bit of pride and humor his brother.

_"Yane yori takai koinobori.”_ Little Hanzo began. His voice was high-pitched, still the voice of a child. His heart felt full, looking down at his little brother, who was mimicking the high turrets of the castle with waving hands held up above his head.

_"Ookī magoi wa otousan.”_ Hanzo sang the second verse, and Genji put his two pointer fingers on top of his upper lip to mimic their father’s mustache.

_“Chīsai higoi wa kodomotachi.”_ Both Hanzos struggled to hold back a laugh.

_“Oretachi!”_ Genji pointed at Hanzo and then to himself. Hanzo nodded and finished the song.

_“Omoshirosouni oyoideru!"_ [9]

Genji laughed again and launched himself at his older brother, hugging him around the middle. They stayed that way for a few minutes. Hanzo gently tapping his fingers against Genji’s back, and Genji happily humming the song in an endless loop against his stomach. The surrounding, albeit far away, woods were full of the sounds of summer, and the few trees in the sprawling inner garden of Shimada Castle weren’t free from the cicadas’ constant song. The wind eased what little discomfort there was to the humidity of the day. Hanzo felt at peace, watching the scene from long ago unfold in front of him.

Genji hadn’t pressed the issue of leaving the castle. He remembered Mother had woken up fine that day. It would be a good day.

_"Onī-chan?”_ Genji’s hopeful voice was muffled somewhat by the fact he had his face pressed up against Hanzo’s shirt.

_"Yada.”_ Hanzo hoped that this time the firmness of his voice would sway his little brother into dropping the subject. No such luck. Instead, Genji dug his fingers into Hanzo’s sides, trying to get a rise out of his older brother. Hanzo sucked in a breath, holding it, refusing to laugh.

_"Genji, yamero!”_ [10] _  
_

Genji did not stop, he just giggled a bit evilly and continued his onslaught. Hanzo retaliated by grabbing him around the middle and heaving him up, using his own weight to toss Genji up and behind him. He hastened to his feet and charged at his brother, who had yet to recover from being thrown.

Genji desperately cried for mercy and held up his hands to protect himself when he realized what Hanzo planned to do.

* * *

 

In a flash, Genji was older. His hair was green again. He was on the ground, red stained tatami, arm tightly wrapped around his side, desperately trying to keep his blood from spilling out any more. The other arm was stretched out to him, reaching out. One green eye was swollen shut, the other looking up at him, begging him.

Hanzo was back in his body, he felt pain on his right arm. He held a sword in his hand.

_"Nī-chan.”_ Genji begged.  [11]

* * *

 

_"Onī-chan!”_ Genji squealed out in between breaths as laughter was forced out of him by Hanzo’s quick fingers.

_"Yane yori takai koinobori."_ He began to sing again, if a bit reluctantly. Anything for his little brother.  [12]

* * *

 

_“Nī-chan.”_ Genji ground out, voice wet with tears and the blood that was leaking from the corner of his mouth.

Hanzo approached, face devoid of emotion, determined. The family required this of him. He would not disappoint. It was his duty.

_“Nī-chan, onegai.”_

* * *

_"Ookī aokoi wa onīsan."_ Hanzo sang as he relentlessly tickled his little brother, who was turning very red. He paused to allow Genji to regain his breath. Genji gave a sigh of relief, but Hanzo wasn’t done.

Genji wheezed out a thin, gasping, _"Dame!"_ right before Hanzo continued his attack.  [13]

_"Chīsai midorikoi wa otouto."_ Hanzo stumbled a bit over the words, as always, trying to make them fit the tune, for his brother’s sake.

* * *

 

Genji had pulled himself up and away, using the last of his strength to bolt through the garden. As Hanzo chased after, he heard quaking laughter coming from far away, paired with a small voice.

_"Dame!”_

Hanzo chased, sliding down the curved stone walls protecting the castle, through alleyways, following the sound of his brother’s light footsteps and his trail of blood. There was blood darkening the white cotton of his _kyudo-gi_. He climbed up a balcony, shoulder grazing a line of laundry hung out to dry. He left his own trail of blood.

Genji was quick, even with a deep wound to his side. But he was beginning to slow. He made it  as far as a thick outcrop of trees on the edge of a small rice field bordering a park. The sounds of a summer night rang all around them. Genji drew his sword.

Genji lost his sword. Genji lost his footing, lost his honor, lost his birthright. He sat still clutching his side against the gnarled roots of a tree.

Hanzo tightened his grip on the katana in his hand. Genji’s lay behind him, out of reach, no longer a threat.

When he drew near enough, however, Genji feigned an attempt to get up, and Hanzo made to subdue him once more, only to gasp in pain as he felt what must be Genji’s _wakizashi_ plunge into the meat of his calf. The offending blade left quickly enough, and Hanzo only had a moment to react before it made contact again, this time it was the hilt that smashed into his kneecap. Hanzo fell.

Genji shuddered a gasp and struggled to get back on his feet and away from his brother. He wanted to run. He didn’t attack, even while Hanzo was down and an easy target. He just ran. Hanzo supposed it was another advantage he had. After all, Genji had always been better than him in close-quarters combat. Genji was foolishly concentrating on defense instead of offense.

Genji hadn’t even defended himself, not with words. The minute he had seen Hanzo walk through the training hall doors of _Shimada-jo_ , sword in hand, he had known. They never fought each other with anything but the reinforced bamboo swords from their youth. Both knew the other was all too likely to get in an actual hit, and neither wanted to bother with unnecessary trips to the infirmary.

Hanzo grit his teeth and followed his brother into the thicket of trees, ignoring the pain in his leg.

Father hadn’t wanted his sons to hurt each other on accident. He hadn’t wanted Genji to get hurt. He didn’t remember that Genji had always been as dedicated to his training as Hanzo had been. It was the one mandated lesson where his attention had never strayed. But Hanzo had the advantage of surprise. And disbelief. And what Genji considered to be unthinkable betrayal.

Genji didn’t get far, and he had lost more blood than Hanzo. He wasn’t attempting to appeal to him with begging eyes or choking words any longer. Genji tried one last lunge, a clumsy strike with his _wakizashi_. Hanzo sidestepped to let him fall to the ground beside him.

But it was once again, another feint.

* * *

 

_“Omoshirosouni oyoideru!”_ Finished the little boy with black hair falling to his shoulders in a smooth curtain of black. He drew his hands back from Genji’s soft exposed belly. Genji huffed and hastened to pull his shirt back down.

_"Onī-chan hidoi yo!"_ [14]

Hanzo grinned at him and stood up, offering his hand to lift Genji back onto his feet. Genji took it with a pout. Hanzo didn’t expect Genji to use the leverage to pull him back onto the ground. He was going to get scolded for the grass stains.

* * *

 

His legs were ruined, they were no longer supporting him. But even on his knees doubled over, he stood taller than the brother who was on his stomach, wounds painting the dirt beneath him a rich, wet, brown. Hanzo’s head was pounding. His heart pumping blood at an alarming rate. The dragons were restless, and Hanzo decided it was out of bloodlust, out of a deeply ingrained sense of justice and honor owed to the family. He didn’t stop to think that another dragon lay before him, just as much a sibling to them as he was to him.

As Hanzo bore over what remained of his younger brother, his anger peaked. He, the betrayer? He, who had stayed loyal to their father’s legacy, and had struggled for over a year to maintain their empire single handedly when they had both been raised to expect the responsibility of leadership? He who had suffered sleepless nights, assassination attempts, and on top of it all, had bailed his useless little brother out of run-ins with the incompetent law. Hanzo had not been the one to fail his brother. Genji had failed him.

And now the clan demanded his failure be paid for, in a way befitting a disgraced son of the Shimada. Paid for in blood.

The katana blade shone in the moonlight as it swung downward in an arc. Genji’s breaths were ragged and uneven, and growing feebler by the second. He was coughing up blood, so much blood. Hanzo tore his gaze away, mouth set in a grimace.

Hanzo knew he had completed what was expected of him. He dropped his sword to the side, his hands shaking with anger and contempt, no doubt. Barely managing to complete the motion before he fell forward, lying inches from his dying brother. Surely he was dying as well. The dragons demanded to never be separated. They belonged together.

Hours passed, perhaps only seconds. But eternity stretched between the time he lay there listening to the diminishing breaths of a little boy who had looked up to him with shining eyes and the time he was lifted onto a stretcher by members of the clan that had no doubt been sent to make sure he did as was expected of him.

He heard someone bark out an order to fetch his sword. He wanted to tell them he didn’t want it. He would never lift a sword again.

Hanzo saw the surrounding city through the door of the van he was carefully carried into. He saw the hazy silhouettes of families sitting down for the evening meal through curtained windows, he closed his eyes and saw the helmeted figurines atop shrines celebrating the wonder of childhood. As they approached the castle, Hanzo felt himself slipping away. The doors to the van opened, and the lights bearing down from the courtyard forced his eyes open.

When he looked up, Hanzo could see the _koinobori_ waving in the wind atop the highest turret of the castle. A big blue one, for him. A smaller green one, for his little brother.

His little brother.

The world stood still. He couldn’t breathe. The dragons twisted and coiled, howling in grief.

What had he done?

* * *

 

_“Omoshirosouni oyoideru!”_ sang Genji, voice light and triumphant, having managed to trick Hanzo. Hanzo watched as the dark haired, happy child standing over him transformed into a tall, lean figure of muted purple and silver. Laughing eyes obscured by a green visor reminiscent of the knights Genji would obsess over in their shared childhood.

_"Omoshirosouni shinderu!"_ Sang the mocking, robotic voice of his brother in his dreams.

* * *

 

Hanzo woke up violently. Eyes now open, his brother’s distorted new voice was still ringing in his ears, singing a bastardization of the song they had cherished in their childhood.

Hanzo sat up and let his eyes adjust to the dark. He was in the cargo area of a carrier bound for Madrid. Up in the air, he didn’t need to hide in between the plastic crates. Security in third-class delivery companies was lax at best, lazy at worst. He had been trying to catch up on a few hours of sleep, only to be woken up by the memory of a living ghost.

That is If he could call what he had forced his brother to become something that is _living._

_Omoshirosouni shinderu._ How pleasing it seems to die.

The air he breathed in deeply was dry and more than a little musty. Under-filtered. Of course, no one gave stowaways the privilege of breathable air.

“How pleasing it _would be_ to die.” Hanzo corrected, English still for the most part feeling awkward and unpracticed on his tongue. He was out of practice, spending most of his time in exile in corners of Asia, venturing to Europe occasionally, only a handful of times venturing further West.

The Shimada-gumi didn’t expect him to spend much time in Japan, so Hanzo found that his time wandering the countryside of Kyoto, Aomori, or even as far north as Hokkaido went mostly undisturbed. The Shimada-gumi had been hard-pressed to hold their former glory without him there to lead them. They had been hard-pressed to survive when the ghost of whom Hanzo now knew to be Shimada Genji had decided that they had no right to live.

A few assassins were nothing. Hanzo had not been bested in the ten years he had spent on the run. Not until-

Green eyes, behind the visor. A harsh voice, calm but angry, nonetheless granting him forgiveness.

Forgiveness.

Where did Genji get the gall to forgive him for what he did, for what he almost did, what he meant to do? What he failed to do, but had lived believing he had accomplished. Ten years wasn’t enough to forgive himself. An eternity wasn’t enough. Hanzo would have let any number of those frankly insulting assassins kill him and be done with it if his pride hadn’t kept him from giving them the undeserved right.

Where did Genji have the heart to forgive him? Hanzo’s heart had been lost long ago when he discovered that he had been willing to sacrifice it to uphold a twisted sense of duty and honor. And what for? For the upkeep of a generations old legacy that would end with him? There had been no point in staying. The Shimada-gumi would end with him, but not with his death.

He sat, uncomfortably aware of the fact that one of his legs was asleep and the other was positioned in a way that would surely lead to a cramp if he moved a single centimeter. With a grunt and a reluctant _"Yosh…"_ he heaved himself up, wincing at the pain shooting up his left leg, and the numb prickling running up his right. His modifications also felt like they would need cleaning soon.  [15]

He went through the motions of stretching, trying to work the aches and pains out of his sore joints and muscles as he had been taught. Subpar delivery companies also apparently didn’t bother to fly their packages in a timely manner. The term “snail mail” came to the forefront of his mind. A term that had never made sense before, as Japan had one of the best postal systems in the world. But now the strange English idiom was relevant, and he was able to grant it meaning.

English idioms would more than likely cause him an absurd amount of headaches, he thought as he remembered that for some reason, the international organization of Overwatch did its business primarily in English. He mused on the last time he had seen his brother as he switched positions, slowly making his way through his morning ritual.

Genji had told him that he hoped he hadn’t left behind his textbooks when he abandoned the clan, because he was going to need them.

* * *

 

_"Nande kore?"_ [16] Hanzo had asked, suspicious, standing on top of an arched roof, architecture reminiscent to that of Japan. But Korean houses were different, more open and slanted. Genji had ignored his question and continued running. Hanzo had had the grace to admit that his immediate response of aiming an arrow at his brother whenever he managed to catch up to him was not much cause for trust and easy conversation.

“Do you truly wish to atone, _nī-chan?"_ Genji had asked when Hanzo had managed to do just that, and corner him in a back alley somewhere in the heart of Seoul. This time, he didn’t lift Storm Bow.

Genji continued, “I have given you all I have to give. You have my acceptance, understanding, and forgiveness. Now you must forgive yourself. But you are not going to achieve that by wallowing in self-hatred and regret. And yes, you are wallowing.” Genji had cut Hanzo off before he had even opened his mouth to retort.

“Yes.” Hanzo had replied to the initial question.

_"Oobaawacchu o shitteru?"_ asked Genji.  [17]

  
_“...... un.”_ [18]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1]Big brother!  
> [2]Brother, look!  
> [3]Be careful!/Watch out!  
> [4]Help me! Brother, help!  
> [5]Sit up straight.  
> [6]Carp banners! Sing the song, please!  
> [7]No/stop  
> [8]Please!  
> [9]Children’s Day koi banner song:  
> The koi banners are higher than the rooftops  
> The big black carp is the father  
> The small golden-red carp is the children  
> How pleasing it is to swim!  
> (and Genji says 'us!' in the middle when he points)  
>   
> [10]Genji, quit it!  
> [11]Big brother  
> [12]The Shimada brothers version:  
> The koi banners are higher than the rooftops  
> The big blue carp is the big brother  
> The small green carp is the little brother  
> How pleasing it is to swim!
> 
> [13]Stop!  
> [14]Brother, you're awful!  
> [15]Ok/alright  
> [16]Why?  
> [17]You know Overwatch?  
> [18]...mmhm  
> 


	2. Information Gap

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen. Listen. I am a mexican living in japan my grasp of any language or slang beyond english, spanish, and kinda japanese is very little. Google does its best.
> 
> See end notes for English translations, hover over text if on pc to see kanji/hangul/hànzì.

He had to admit that he had lost Genji in Myanmar. Hanzo stood in the carved wooden halls of the Shwenandaw Monastery, trying not to show his irritation through anything other than a clenched fist. Genji had been performing what seemed to be a pilgrimage, much to Hanzo’s chagrin. The impossible sparrow, flitting from place to place, never bothering to get anywhere in a timely manner. Shrine after temple after monastery. A brief stint in South Korea, an infuriating hunt in China until finally he had caught up to Genji in Vietnam, only for his trace to vanish a few days later. What was Genji doing? He hadn’t said which one of the old Watchpoints was serving as base for the new insurgent Overwatch, and his redundant trail had taken out a few options and left Hanzo with little to go on.

It was by chance that he saw the news walking down a run-down market street in Bangladesh. A holo projector set up on a rickety plastic table, a swarm of curious shoppers surrounding it. Hanzo stood in the shade of a vacant trinkets stall and watched. He didn’t understand Bengali, but he understood the reporter’s harried tone speaking about the Vishkar Corporation. There was movement outside their base in Utopaea, clandestine sparkling buildings crawling with reporters and onlookers, desperate for news about _something_. Calm Vishkar representatives tried to quell the masses while steely architechs stood behind them, watching. The footage cut back to the reporter, who pulled up a map of Brazil, of all places.

Hanzo tried to recall what he knew of current events, and found that he knew very little of the purpose behind Vishkar’s involvement in Latin America. Their work in their own homelands had seemed efficient enough, and produced good results. Hanzo looked around where he stood and shrugged. The people seemed to be doing well enough here, ramshackle buildings and questionable smells aside. At least he saw no beggars, and the elderly he had seen were safely ensconced in their family homes. He hadn’t paid much attention to the goings on of the world since the resurrection of his brother had taken over all his waking thoughts.

He directed his attention back to the holo. The people of Rio looked to be in an uproar, protesters threatening to bring the raised platform a line of Vishkar representatives stood on to the ground. Clearly they were unhappy with whatever treatment Vishkar had seen fit to give their homes. Hanzo scowled, eyes squinting to better see the grainy video of a streak of green light, and literal- were those _sound waves?-_ blowing back a security guard that seemed to be a little too sure of himself and his position in his handling of a couple of protesters. Teenagers, by the look of it. The video cut off with the voice of a very excited girl speaking rapid fire Portuguese and the reporter was seen again, solemnly informing the viewers of something Hanzo didn’t understand. Footage cut to what appeared to be reconstruction efforts in a museum somewhere. Workers were adjusting panels of glass against a clear blue sky.

The reporter minimized the video stream and pulled up a screenshot of a blue social media page, a speech bubble hovering over a little bird with the icon of a frog sitting at the top corner. It was in Portuguese. Hanzo didn’t speak Portuguese. Inexplicably, the newscast ended and was replaced with an American western, because suddenly there was a close up of a cowboy grinning from ear to ear on the screen.

“Now, we’d be happy to-” The owner of the projector turned it off, cutting off the actor onscreen.

When the free newscast ended, a few of the shoppers left, grocery bags in hand, to disappear into the crowds of the market. The ones that remained began to speak, others to whisper excitedly, and Hanzo stepped closer to hear.　

He didn’t speak Bengali, but Overwatch was the same in every language.

From there, he hid on the back of a produce truck bound for Kolkata, caught a bus to Nagpur, then rode an express line heading straight to Utopaea. He kept an ear to the ground as he made his way in the shadows of the immaculate city Vishkar had created. Avoiding architechs, keeping low, never making eye contact with anyone who seemed even a bit likely to find him suspicious. That is to say, everyone. The people of Utopaea were all disturbingly similar. Hanzo suppressed fleeting concern and kept his ears open.

He didn’t speak Hindi, but a night spent avoiding sensors and drones on the roof of what seemed to be the on-site architech’s dormitory gave him the only clue he needed.

“ _Jibraaltar._ ”

An assassin caught up to him on his way up to New Delhi and delayed him for a few hours, but Hanzo disposed of her eventually. He snuck into the spaceport in the dead of night, keeping in the blindspots of security cameras and scanners he had scoped out earlier in the day. He boarded an unassuming carrier headed to Madrid and tried not to think too hard about what he would say when he faced his brother.

He made a note not to reach for Storm Bow first, when he did.

* * *

 

He should have thought harder about how he would go about getting to the point where he faced his brother.

The thought struck him as he watched the town of La Línea de la Concepción fly by from his perch atop a large commerce truck. He didn’t know how to get to the Watchpoint, and he didn’t know how to get in when he did. He entertained the idea of having to break in, or having to lay low and watch, scouting an entryway. Genji might not even be there yet. He had a vague idea where the Gibraltar Watchpoint was, he knew it faced the east, on the shore overlooking the Mediterranean. He knew, wherever it was, it would be flashy, and big, and an altogether bad place to hide a renegade group of vigilantes. But Overwatch had been big and bold in its glory days, and the derelict Watchpoints reflected that.

Fortunately, he found it wasn’t hard to find.

Hanzo frowned at the frantic reporters flocking around the base of a winding seaside road hugging the edge of the beginning of a series of cliffs. He followed the trail of media vehicles that were trying to clamber their way up the very narrow road. He wondered what else had happened between the time he left India and the time he made it here.

Well, the main road was not an option.

Hanzo turned and left before he caught anyone’s attention. Walking a ways revealed a smaller path, only visible because of a fresh pair of heavy tracks and more than a few broken branches leading up to it. Someone else had been trying to avoid the media on their way up, evidently someone who knew the area. Hanzo followed it. Deeper in the path widened, and it appeared to be some sort of hiking path. The path never veered off or forked, simply leading up, up, and up.

The path was steep, the footing not always secure. But Hanzo made sure to stay silent, knowing that whoever had taken the path before him could still be nearby. Judging by the bent branches and dragging footprints in the moist dirt, whoever it was was having trouble making the climb.

He turned a corner, ducked below a low hanging (and half-broken) branch and stopped. The path widened, showing evidence of tire tracks, older foot traffic, and most importantly-

The ones he had been following were gone. He reached for Storm Bow.

“Freeze!” A shrill female voice yelled. Hanzo had already nocked an arrow and aimed it at the voice. From behind a craggy rock face in front of him stepped out a girl swaddled in a blue lined thick fur coat, glass hair piece glittering in the early morning sun. “You make that shot and I’ll turn you blue before it gets to me!”

What did that mean?

Hanzo didn’t move, not even to bring the bow down in surrender. Her grip on the gun was just a bit too relaxed, she didn’t expect to have to actually use it. It would be simple to disarm her, if it came down to that. She was panting very slightly, face pink with exertion. Behind her hovered some sort of round drone, making lazy u-shapes.

“Right, so… Excuse me sir…” said the girl, voice light and polite despite the odd gun she had aimed at his chest. “I’m going to have to ask you what you’re doing here. Not many people wander this far up, and, well, it’s kind of hard to do if you’re many people.”

Hanzo kept staring at her. The arrow never shifted, aimed directly at her head.

“And I don’t think you are. Many people, I mean.” she went on, “I mean, I think? English is not my first language. Wait.” She looked him up and down, no doubt taking his clothing into account. “Can you understand me? Do you speak English? _Nǐ shuō zhōngwén ma? Hangukmal hasil jul aseyo? Nihongo o hanasemasu ka?”_ She tried. [1]

 _"Boku wa chūgokugo o hanasenai."_ He spoke curtly. [2]

“Ah! _Wakarimashita! Eeto…”_ [3]

“However, I do speak English.” he told her before she could finish. She sighed in relief. She lowered the gun. He lowered Storm Bow.

“Oh good. I haven’t practiced Japanese in… decades.” she said. Hanzo repressed the urge to lift an eyebrow. She didn’t look very old. Perhaps in her mid twenties. “Anyway, what are you doing here? You don’t look like the media, you don’t have recording equipment. I’ll take it you’re not an enemy, you didn’t fire. Well, I did have a gun on you, but still...”

“I come in search of my brother.”

“Your brother?” She narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously. The effect was ruined a bit by her thick glasses. The gun at her side twitched, she was itching to lift it. “What’s his name?”

“...Genji.” he answered just as suspiciously. She still seemed unsure whether to raise her gun or not. Storm Bow remained resting against his front, arrow held ready in his hand. Aiming and shooting would only take a second, if she got jumpy. But if she was Overwatch, it wouldn’t do to attack her.

“Oh! Shimada?” she brightened. Hanzo gave a small nod. Suddenly, her suspicion was gone and replaced with a chatterbox. “I know him! I met him once or twice back before I was stationed in Antarctica. He was really nice! I had to let him down gently, but he was nice!”

So he hadn’t changed much, Hanzo mused.

“Well, I don’t know if he’s back on base yet, he sounded like he was trying to find someone when he found me back in Qufu. Seemed a bit surprised to see me. But I told him about everyone that had made it here and he seemed really excited to get back. He and McCree were really good friends, so you understand.” She put her gun securely in the heavy-looking holster strapped to her middle. It was a heavy looking gun, too, for a girl her size. It was attached to some sort of fuel cell hanging on her back. It was the end of May, the climb had clearly exhausted her. Wasn’t the getup uncomfortably hot?

“Well, if he’s expecting you, it won’t do to keep him waiting!” She gave him a friendly smile and motioned for him to follow her up the path. He ducked under her drone and fell into step beside her, a bit taken aback at her easy friendliness. He had expected her to dislike him, but perhaps Genji didn’t make their history known. Hanzo didn’t expect her friendliness to be shared by the rest of Genji’s teammates.

“He isn’t.” He told her reluctantly. He had to be prepared for open animosity. He deserved no less.

“Oh! A surprise then? I suppose we’re not supposed to give out our location to family but I can’t blame him. If I had anyone left I would want to let them know.”

He didn’t say anything. She continued to talk to him, and introduced herself as Mei-Ling Zhou. She told him that she had answered the recall weeks ago, but had gone off to try out her equipment and see if any of her old research had made it through the fall of Overwatch. She asked how long he expected to stay, and if he wanted to join the team. She asked if he could give her a demonstration with his bow. He refused to comment and refused to demonstrate. She didn’t seem very put down by his gruffness. In fact, she simply nodded, taking the hint, and fell into silence besides him.

Hanzo didn’t like idle chatter, but she was his way into the Watchpoint, and so he thought he should at least try to be amiable. Feeling a bit rude, Hanzo struggled to find something to talk about.

“If you are returning, why is no one here to greet you?” he settled on.

“Oh. The main road is cut off, as you saw, by that pack of vultures. They must have activated the barriers to keep them out. Which is weird, I mean, what happened in Switzerland was like a week ago. I wonder if it’s something else.”

“What happened in Switzerland?”

“Oh you didn’t hear? The whole thing with Doomfist’s gauntlet at the museum?”

Hanzo shook his head.

“Well, I’m sure Winston and Lena will tell us the story once we’re up there. Once we reach the main road, the cameras will catch us and Athena will let Winston know. To answer your question, I, uh…” she trailed off sheepishly and Hanzo waited for her to continue. She went on, “I kind of wanted it to be a surprise. I told them all I would be gone for longer. I didn’t expect to find….” She trailed off, hesitant to continue in front of a stranger.

The dirt road turned into an old asphalt road, and they turned to follow it up to the main road overlooking the sea. It looked newer, recently paved, with guard rails intact. It wrapped around the coastline, the sea splashing angrily against the rocks directly below. The Watchpoint was in clear view, sitting on top of a pale cliff, towering over the rest of the rocky hillside. Its walls gleamed in the morning sun, and Hanzo wondered if the turrets were as heavily armed as they appeared. For the most part it looked intact, if a bit uninhabited and rusty. No one was outside. That was most likely due to the media drones hovering around what seemed to be the main entrance.

Once they stepped onto the road, something on Mei’s person began to beep almost immediately.

“Ah, that’s me. I better take this.” Mei dug in one of the pouches on her utility belt until she pulled out a rectangular communicator. The screen was lit up, hologram projector showing a picture of a girl with a shock of messy brown hair spiked impossibly high, wearing big orange goggles. “Lena?”

“Mei! Is that you walking up the road? Well of course it’s you, innit? I’m lookin’ atcha right now.” A bright and bubbly heavily accented voice streamed out of the little device. Hanzo frowned in concentration, struggling to make out what she was saying through the accent. Mei looked up and waved to what Hanzo assumed was a camera. He heard a giggle from the comm.

“Yeah, I had to go the long way. What’s with all the media?” asked Mei. Hanzo could hear footsteps in the background coming from the receiver.

“Pipe down you lot, Mei’s back!” Lena said to someone on her side. “Ah, well, see…” Lena’s voice became muffled and there was yelling on her end. It sounded like many people, most likely arguing, and apparently about different things. The loudest voice was in a different accent, distinctly American, and it was yelling something about a poster.

“Winston wants to know how you got past the shields, love.” Lena asked after a short lull.

“Oh, tell him he needs to fix the coverage around the southwest hillside. The trail is still clear.”

“Ah, that old thing? I’ll tell ‘im to add it to the list. Who was that with you? Hold on, just a tick-”

More yelling, and apparently a scuffle for the comm, because the next thing to come out of it was an indignant man shouting in an American southern accent.

“Girl, tell me you at least brought me back a poster!”

They were close, now. Hanzo heard Mei soothingly tell whoever it was that she hadn’t forgotten about him. He kept his eye on the Watchpoint. The drones had caught on to something and were moving off to the side. One of the big doors opened just a bit, and in a blink of blue light, the door was closed again and the girl from the comm call was standing in front of them. Her little icon hadn’t included the bright blue contraption glowing merrily on her chest. It was strapped snugly over her bomber jacket, and had the look of something well used. Likely she hardly took it off. Her legs, clad in tight orange leggings, were impossibly long. Strange, she wasn’t much shorter than him.

“They’re having themselves a domestic in there, I had to get away.” Lena chirped. Mei hung up on the call, cutting off the strange man’s whoops of joy. She flung herself onto Lena, wrapping her in a big hug.

“Lena! Who else is here?” Mei asked once she let go. Lena looked to be a bit in awe of her, and a bit in awe of what just happened.

“Ah, lessee… You left ‘round the time McCree made it back, yeah?” Lena asked. Mei nodded. “Well, for the most part it’s just been me n’ him n’ Winnie. Reinhardt came back ‘bout a week ago, though. Genji and his omnic friend showed up yesterday. Mercy got here today, and she’s right pissed ‘bout our stint in Switzerland. Anyway, hello! Who’re you? You another Overwatch hopeful?” She turned her bright eyes onto Hanzo.

Hanzo opened his mouth to reply, but Mei beat him to it.

“He’s Genji’s brother. Omnic friend? What do you mean, another hopeful? Are we recruiting again?” she asked excitedly. Hanzo was perfectly content with standing there and listening to Mei go on, but Lena zeroed in on him with a big smile.

“Genji-kun’s never mentioned a brother! How exciting! We would’ve kept an eye out. I’m Lena, call sign: Tracer.” She let out a small giggle and began walking backwards, pointing at the Watchpoint doors over her shoulder. “Let’s get you to your brother, love. What did you say your name was?”

Mei perked up, paying attention. Hanzo saw no harm in answering. “Shimada Hanzo.”   

“Pleasure. Right, just a mo’.” she turned on her heel and blinked out of existence. Mei noticed his confusion and pointed towards the doors, where Lena was trying to swat the drones away with a broom. “Bugger off you lot! Get a move on, go on! Nothin’ to see ‘ere!” She managed to get them to warily back away a few meters, and motioned for them to move quickly as she slid open one of the doors.

Mei started jogging, and Hanzo followed her example, which is to say, her.

A friendly Chinese climatologist from Antarctica. A bubbly British pilot from an experiment gone wrong, if he correctly remembered the news articles covering new Overwatch agents from years past. Already, Hanzo felt himself questioning his decision to follow his brother.

Inside the main doors, it was dark. Overhead lights slowly flickered to life when they made their way past the main foyer. She led them through more hallways, many showed signs of disuse. Lena apologized, and explained that they had mostly been using side entrances since the media showed up a few nights ago following Lúcio’s announcement. Hanzo knew that name. It belonged to some sort of music idol. Mei apparently didn’t know who it was, and lamented no longer being “hip and with it.” Lena laughed and told her not to worry. They would all meet him soon enough.

“And speaking of Lúcio…” Lena led them to a wide set of double doors, light streaming through the bottom of the doorway. Raised voices could be heard from within. “It’s all gone a bit tits up, honestly. Sorry Hanzo, but I don’t think you have clearance to be here for this. I can take you to where Zenyatta is. Or. Well, let me pop in and ask Genji-kun. Mei, stay with him, will you love?”

“Sure!”

“Back in a sec.” She winked, and was gone. The door left ajar was the only evidence she had gone through at all. Mei began to fiddle with her drone, crooning something in Mandarin. Hanzo directed his attention to what he could see through the crack in the doorway. He could hear every word being said from within. He could see a blonde woman, and a large older man who seemed to take up the majority of the bench he was seated on. From the side of the room he couldn’t see, he heard talking.

“We had to do something, and Athena was undergoing system updates. She couldn’t be left alone!” The gruff sound of a tired man at his wit’s end.

“So you left Jesse in charge?!” The blonde woman, exasperated and bordering angry. Her hair was tied up in a messy ponytail, glasses riding low on the bridge of her nose. She wore a white lab coat over jeans and a form-fitting tank top. She had her arms crossed, and her fingers were tapping away restlessly against her arm.  

“Hey now, why do you say it like-” The loud American again, from somewhere he couldn’t see.  

“McCree is a capable man, Angela!” The large old man boomed. German, by the sound of him. He clapped the woman on the back and she staggered a bit with the force of it.

“He volunteered!” The first man, the tired one, said.

“Listen, I couldn’t get a hold of the three of ‘em, and I had to make a call! Guy like that, media hounding me enough as it was, it couldn’t wait! And besides, Genji said he was on his way. I thought I’d have company.” The American sounded defensive.

“He is telling the truth, Angela-sama. I did send word I was on my way.” Genji, just out of sight.

“ _Äbä_!” Now the woman, Angela, turned on Genji. “As if you would have stopped him! By yourselves, you’re impossible. Together, you’re a menace.” [4]

“Oh come now darlin’, you know you wouldn’ta turned him away neither.”

“I wouldn’t have done it so publicly either, Jesse!” A sigh. The sound of shuffling movement followed by a few quiet _excuse me’s_. The door slid open and Tracer stepped out, followed by Genji.

For a minute, the brothers just stared at each other. Then, a short sound of static and Genji gave a robotic laugh to say, “Ah, _onī-chan_. You always did have the most terrible timing.”

_"Douiu imi?”_ [5]

_“Nandemonai._ Hello again, Mei. I hope your journey here went well?” [6]

“It was a bit hard to get _xuě qiú_ past customs, but it was alright. Did you find who you were looking for?” Mei caught her drone as it buzzed past her shoulder and tucked it beneath her arm. Lena squealed and bent over to look at it closely. [7]

“Yes, I found him in Hanoi. We traveled here together.” Genji stepped aside to let Mei and Lena enter the boisterous room. Mei thanked him and walked in with Lena at her heels, sliding the door shut securely behind her. The crowd gathered inside greeted her warmly and loudly. Hanzo felt the beginning of a headache.

Alone again, both brothers seemed at a bit of a loss for what to say. He felt his headache worsen.

“I hope you found your way here without trouble. I realize now I never exactly told you where Overwatch was gathering.” Genji said unapologetically.

“Your organization is loud, and not subtle. If they had hoped to keep this _recall_ a secret from the United Nations, they have done a poor job of it. The media lying in wait at the foot of the hill proves this.” Hanzo said. He felt more than out of sorts, speaking to his dead brother in the home of heroes. Genji’s tone was light and casual, as if picking right off from where they left off more than a decade ago. As if the truth of what Hanzo had been capable of was a mere afterthought; unimportant.

“Yeah, Tracer and Winston could have handled things a bit better. And McCree…” Genji huffed another laugh. “No matter. What is done is done. Come, meet the team.” He pointed with his thumb to the door behind him.

Hanzo balked. “I doubt I am welcome within your ranks.”

“They do not know, brother.” Genji gently assured.

“Then that is worse. Their first impression of me will be incomplete. What happened between us should not be ignored. Brother, I… do not wish to speak of this in so public a place.” He eyed the door. Anyone could walk out at any moment.

Genji sighed. The sound odd and vibrating through whatever technology had kept his voice intact. He nodded towards the hallway, and they began to walk. Silence hung heavy between them. Hanzo mused that his brother had not forgotten his training, to not make a sound while walking despite the changes to his body. Hanzo felt he should not lead his brother to believe he was here to join his team. They turned a corner and he steeled his resolve.

“Genji, I must have you know that I have no intention of staying.” Hanzo said. Genji sucked in a breath and held out an arm, stopping him.

“Hanzo, you could be of use here!”

Hanzo pushed his arm aside, a sudden, sickly feeling settling in his gut when his hands made contact with cold metal. He kept walking. “I will not play hero for an unworthy defunct organization that saw its well-deserved end due to infighting.”

“ _Nī-chan_ , we’re desperate.” Genji took no time to catch up. “The world needs us right now. You have no idea of what’s happening-”

Suddenly, it was as if the blank walls around them turned to wood, the tiles under their feet to tatami, and the doors along the hall to paper screens. They were at it as if no time had passed, fighting, interrupting each other before the other could get their point across properly. Genji refused to let tradition still his tongue. Hanzo, the indignant elder brother, refused to be interrupted.

“Nor do I wish to. Genji I simply came here to make peace with you, and to-”

“Hanzo, I told you, you’re forgiven.”

“It cannot be as simple as that!”

“But it is! If only you would-”

“No. Genji, I took your life-”

 _"Nī-chan. Boku wa koko ni iru._ I am not dead. You took nothing from me that I-” [8]

“No.” Hanzo stopped and turned to face his brother. The motion sensors in that section of the hallway were not in operation, and so the lights were not turning on. In the dim light, Genji emitted an eerie green light that filled the space around them. “Do not attempt to tell me that all is forgiven, and that all is forgotten. I may not have killed you, but I took your life. I took our lives, as they were, as we knew them. And that is a debt I owe you. I have lived ten years trying to atone for what I did. Trying to follow your childish, senseless, stupid idea of heroism. That life is not fit for me. I am not a hero, Genji. I do not deserve the ideals of Overwatch.”

His confession was met with silence.

Genji had his visor lowered; Hanzo could not see his eyes. But he felt his gaze, and he knew that behind the expressionless mask that had become his face, his brother was thinking. He knew the feeling of the mischievous glint in Genji’s eyes.

A short sound alike to static. Hanzo had heard it every time before Genji spoke, the new telltale sign that the fox was about to lay out a trap.

“Do you truly wish to atone, _nī-chan_?” He mirrored the same words he had spoken on a dark night in Seoul.  

“You know my answer, Genji. Do not waste our time.” Hanzo made to resume walking. Genji stopped him.

“You took that life away from me, yes. In doing so, you decided that it was to become yours. My life as a leader of the Shimada-gumi. You took it, and you left it behind. Still, it belonged to me.” He said.

Hanzo nodded, unsure of where he was going with his speech.   

“You owe me my life with the Shimada-gumi.”

Another nod.

“Well then, the time has come to settle your debt. You took my life, and so now I will take yours.” Genji’s voice was solemn.

There was a sword strapped to his back. Genji didn’t reach for it.

“…And I will take your life for Overwatch.” Hanzo could tell that Genji would be grinning triumphantly, if he were still able to smile.

“No.”

“You have to.” Genji sing-songed.

_"Yada.”_ [9]

“You owe me my life, brother. This is only fair.” Genji taunted.

Anger rose to choke at his throat. “Do not make light of this!”

Genji’s playful mood evaporated. “I have the right. You will stay and fight for a better world. With me. With Overwatch. It is the only thing I ask, _onī-chan._ Won’t you give me this?”

Hanzo didn’t know where to direct his glare, seeing as Genji didn’t have eyes to fixate on. He leveled it at the green slit of his visor, but knew that his brother was going to get exactly what he wanted, his pride be damned.　

He gave a heavy sigh, stalled as long as possible, and nodded.

Genji made a strange motion, as if he were about to hop on the balls of his feet in excitement. Then he did just that. It was something he had done often enough in their life before. Hanzo willed the memory away.

He moved quickly, guiding Hanzo back down the hallway they had just walked through. In a childish moment of inspiration, Genji fell behind him to shove at him gently from the back. Rushing him, afraid he would change his mind.

“Come, meet the team.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mei posted selfies of herself at the premiere of 6- Gun Killer and McCree cri evrytiem  
>   
> [1]Do you speak Mandarin/Korean/Japanese, respectively.  
> [2]I do not speak Chinese  
> [3]Understood! Umm…  
> [4]Yeah right/sure  
> [5]What do you mean?  
> [6]Nevermind  
> [7]Snowball  
> [8]I am right here  
> [9]No/Stop


	3. Talking in Circles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See end notes for translations.

The thing about childhood friends is that they follow you into adulthood and know how to press all your buttons.

“Overwatch was shut down for a reason. Maybe it's best it stay that way. With only a single mission, you’ve already managed to send the UN and the media into a frenzy! The Petras Act is not to be taken lightly! We can be prosecuted for this! We are not above the law!”

“Angie, come on. We done plowed that furrow clean down t’the bedrock. It’s time to rest the mule.” McCree muttered, bringing his hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose. His good mood at Mei’s return had quickly left when the discussion continued to go nowhere. They had been going at it for more than an hour. Mercy was against starting up recruitment this early on. She wasn’t even completely convinced the recall was a good idea. She had been there for the talks with the UN. She knew the accords better than anyone. As much as she loved Overwatch and their cause, she was always proper, always a stickler for the rules. And having this many of them back in Gibraltar was decidedly against all the rules the world had decided for them.

Jesse didn’t mind. He never gave the idea of being anything close to proper much importance.

Lena had been a breath of fresh air when she took her break from watching the cameras. Athena was clearing her cache, and was too overworked to run surveillance. Lena had jumped at the opportunity to leave the room and its heavy atmosphere to watch some cameras for a while. She had brought in Mei, taken Genji, and settled back against Reinhardt’s side, no doubt monitoring the cameras remotely from the tablet in her hands.

“You told me to take my time! That you had everything under control.” Angela was this close to outright yelling, he knew. She stared down at them from her seat at the head of the long, cluttered table. Athena’s blue insignia flickered in the large black screen lit up behind her, but the AI had been quiet so far.

Tracer and Reinhardt had chosen to sit at the benches along the wall of the room. The spot at the table to Mercy’s right had become vacant when Genji stepped out. Winston sat to her left. Mei sat next to him, looking more concerned by the minute, and he couldn’t blame her. Not a month into the recall and already squabbling like cats and dogs.

McCree had been sitting at the other end, feet up on the table and lounging when Mercy had walked in, shrugged a backpack off and scolded him for his manners as if five long years hadn’t passed since they had last seen each other. Then the rest had filed in and all hell had broken loose.

“Mercy, they needed you there more than here, love.” Lena tried.

“Lena, you went in without support against _Talon._ You needed me. I should have been here!”

The thing about childhood friends is that you can see right through them. McCree knew that she was angry at herself, that she hadn’t given watching over their fledgling Overwatch more priority than victims of war in Syria. But he also knew she didn’t regret it. She was just angry she couldn’t always be a miracle worker. Angela only ever got upset when she realized she couldn’t be a miracle worker.

“Reinhardt is fine. He’s got thick skin, you know that. He had to be the choke point, or else more Talon operatives would have made it into the museum. Thanks to him, Lena and I made it out and saved the day! Take a breath, stop worrying about what could have happened. You’re here now. You can help us figure out who Talon’s other operative is, and what they were planning to do with the locations of all previous Overwatch agents.” Winston tried to make his voice soothing, but he was weary, and even at the best of times his voice sounded gruff.

McCree looked up, leaned his chair back to get a better view of the room, and tipped his hat back for good measure. “Say huh? Other operative? Meaning we know who one of ‘em is?”

“Reaper is the name of the Talon agent that infiltrated this base before the recall.” Winston clarified.

“Reaper?” Mei asked.

“Athena has been able to piece together enough info on Talon’s recent activity to know that particular operative’s call sign. The tall, dark, and smoking one. As for the other one…”

Winston and Lena exchanged looks. Winston looked apologetic. Lena looked uncomfortable. She set her tablet aside and straightened up to address the room.

“Sorry loves. Meant to tell you, I did. But with everything going on...”

“Go on girl, get it out.” Reinhardt elbowed her encouragingly. Lena nodded and took a deep breath.

“Round the time Winston called it, I was back home. King’s Row. I… well I was there to hear Tekhartha Mondatta speak. I saw something shifty on a rooftop and went to investigate. Found a sniper getting ready to take the shot. I tried to stop her and… well, you saw the news.” Murmurs of assent and a few of genuine grief. “While I tried to fight her off, I recognized her. She was always at those posh parties I got an invite to back when I got chosen for the Slipstream.” Lena paused, seemed to gather herself and solemnly stated, “It was Amélie.”

Mei gasped, Mercy closed her eyes, and McCree struggled to keep his chair from tilting too far back and dropping his ass as he yelled, “ _Lacroix?!_ ”

Mei was shaking her head frantically, eyes wide. “That does it. Mercy, I know you don’t like it, and I know it’s too early, but look at us. There’s seven of us. We don’t know who else will answer the call. We need to take what we can get and put a stop to whatever Talon is doing.” Ah, good old Mei. Head as cold as that gun of hers. McCree grunted his approval. Winston did the same.

Angela sighed, still upset but defeated. She turned to look at Lena, eyes almost begging to be wrong. “Are you sure it was Amélie?”

Lena didn’t give her that comfort. “It was her. But she was… different. Her hair was longer, her skin was… blue. I think Talon… did something to her.”

“You serious?” Jesse groaned. He felt a headache starting to pang at the base of his skull. A smoke would be very much appreciated.

“As the plague, love. I’d know her anywhere. But she… it seemed like she remembered me, she just _didn’t care.”_ Lena’s voice went soft, quiet. “I think I understand now, how she just disappeared after… Gérard…”

The room fell away into silence. No one wanted to follow that. They sat for a while, the heavy reality of what they had once again decided to do weighing heavily on each of them. McCree remembered Gérard and his smiling wife. Gabe had said he was good to work with, but a grunt like Jesse had never had the occasion to meet such a fine fellow. What he knew was what he gleaned from simple observation. And simple observation had told him that The Lacroix’s had been a very happy couple indeed.

And Talon had managed to make sweet Miss Amélie a cold blooded murderer. He suppressed a shiver. If that’s what they did to the spouses of Overwatch operatives, McCree didn’t have a hard time imagining what they would have done with prior Overwatch agents’ locations had Winston and Athena not managed to fight them off.

“Jesse, when did this Lúcio say he would be arriving? We should deal with this when both he and Zenyatta are present.”

“Uh, he said he was shootin’ for ‘round late afternoon. But with them vultures doggin’ ‘im every step of the way, I’d expect him t’be a little late.”

Angela gave one last soft sigh and stood tall, squaring her shoulders, looking ready to take on the world. “Alright. Enough of this. Winston, what are our orders?”

“Oh. Um.” He gave a heavy snort, shook his head as if to clear it, straightened his glasses, and stood up on all fours. “I’m going to finish up getting the security system completely back online, updates should have finished installing soon. Athena, I’ll need you for that. We’re making that a priority. As for the rest of you, I suppose… We should make this place presentable. There’s going to be more of us, we need to get rooms ready.” Winston gave Angela an apologetic smile. “The recall was as much of a surprise to me as it was to all of you. And, uh, well, you see… I wasn’t expecting this much company. Everything’s a mess. And you know us Mercy. We’re not the tidiest.”

Angela shot a look straight at Jesse. He raised his arms over his head in disbelief. “Who said it was me?!”

“Sorry.” muttered Winston.

“I did my best, Angela! The kitchen remains my domain, and I have kept it in perfect condition. But these three,” Reinhardt gave him, Winston, and Lena an accusing, if not kind, look, “...are almost too much for me!”

“Do I even want to ask what happened to the cleaning bots?” Mercy rubbed at her temples.

“Two are still functional. As for the rest...ah… I took them apart for parts?” Winston winced.

“A necessary action, Agent Mercy. Winston had to launch the satellite.” Athena piped up, her icon flashing.

Lena mumbled something about a broom, and Reinhardt volunteered to go play baseball with the media drones hovering outside. He didn’t have a bat, so his hammer would have to do. McCree shot the big man a grin. Creative fella. Reinhardt stood up to do just that, and left the room. Lena followed, still talking about brooms, and Winston and Mei were quick to go after them.

Angela and Jesse stayed, looking at each other from opposite ends of the long briefing table. She looked tired.

“Fer what it’s worth, we did clean out the main dorm wing and the cafeteria. We ain’t animals, Angie.” McCree came to Winston’s defense, and then paused, processing his own choice of words. “There’s a room ready for you there, unless you prefer to kip in yer old medbay. Go take a nap, we’ll hold the fort until the new kid gets here.”

“Very comforting, Jesse. I don’t suppose you would like to join Reinhardt outside and also tell the drones about Zenyatta?” Mercy swooped down to pick up her backpack and walked to his side. She yanked his hat over his face playfully. He squawked in affront.

“Hey come on now! After a nap you won’t be feeling half as annoyed at me as ya are now.” He pulled the rim back up, smiling at her widely. She looked beat down and weary, but she hadn’t aged a day since he last saw her. He could almost see the halo of her tactical suit hovering above her head. 37, and still a vision. A literal angel. Ah, how he’d missed her.

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that. I’m sure you’ll manage to do something ridiculous again sooner or later. Just don’t end up in my medbay. Speaking of which, I’m off to give it a good cleaning. Where’s the bleach?”

“Under the kitchen sink. But your disinfectant stuff is still in the maintenance closet by the operating room.” He stood up and followed her when she made her way to the door.

“Thank you. I'm not used to state of the art facilities these days, it’s going to take me a few days to get it all back in working order. I would appreciate it if you helped me, goodness knows what a state Winston let it fall to. I’ll have to find out where he has those bots.” She opened the door and she and McCree had a silent fight over who should go through it first. McCree won with a bow and an exaggerated swooping gesture with his hand and Angela stepped through the doorway and went on. “The medbay really should be a priority- Oh! Genji! Who is this?”

“Angela-sama! Is the briefing over? Was an agreement reached? I have another recruit!”

Another thing about childhood friends; their tells are easy to read. McCree took in Angela’s change in posture, the way she held herself carefully taunt and how she shifted her weight to rest on her opposite hip so she could keep McCree inside the room. She didn’t betray anything, but Jesse knew immediately that something was wrong. There was something in her voice that put him on edge. He put his left hand on the doorframe and reached for Peacekeeper with his right.

“Who’s the stray this time?” He drawled flippantly and leaned forward to look over Mercy’s shoulder.

First he saw Genji, bent slightly at the hip in a bow directed at Angela. His black scarf fell onto his shoulder, looking a bit like hair. Second, he saw a glint of gold. Directly behind him, standing off to the side and looking for the world like he’d rather be anywhere else was a man. He was looking at Mercy, meeting her polite smiling mask with a frown and narrowed eyes. A golden scarf held his black hair up in a high ponytail. Black hair that was beginning to grey at his temples, McCree noticed, and decided it fit him well. Made him seem wise and refined. But his face betrayed little, and McCree was almost distracted by the regal haughtiness of his features. Sharp jawline framed by neat facial hair, shapely neck, heavy brows, high cheekbones. Okay, McCree was distracted.

But not distracted enough not to notice that this guy’s everything screamed thinly veiled hostility. McCree’s hand wrapped around the grip of his gun.  

This new recruit was wearing some sort of traditional wear, it looked Japanese. The dark blue silk was dyed with muted colors in an intricate design that McCree’s eyes gave up on following when they reached his left side and found nothing but skin. Nice, taut, tan skin over broad shoulders and heavy muscle. And impressive ink, too. Were those?-- yep, those were dragons tattooed in a sleeve on his left arm. If the fella really was Japanese, then McCree may have found his Eastern counterpart on the whole too-attached-to-a-certain-image deal they both seemed to have going. If his look screamed cowboy, then this guy was shouting ninja yakuza. If only his hair were in one of those ridiculous coifs. Anyway.

Who walked around with their whole side hanging out like that? Even for aesthetic? Not that the man couldn’t pull it off, McCree allowed himself a second or two of ogling before he went back to assessing and focused on the bow and quiver at his back. A sniper, then. Maybe a friend of Genji’s from his past with the Shimada-gumi? McCree wasn’t one to judge.

He sure was pretty.

“Angela-sama, this is my brother, Hanzo.” Genji stepped to the side to allow Hanzo and Angela to face each other. “I wish for him to join our team.”

Now hold on. His brother?  

“Ah, nice to meet you. I am Dr. Angela Ziegler.” She nodded her head at him politely, and McCree finally caught on to what he didn’t grasp before. She had known all along. She didn’t relax. If anything she got tenser. McCree hung back, trying to process what was happening.

“Shimada Hanzo.” the man replied curtly, and gave a quick bow. Reluctant to lose visual for the sake of pleasantries. Just as tense. McCree fought the urge to snort. Yeah, he had reason to be tense. McCree shot him a glare that went ignored. What the fuck was Genji doing? Zenyatta was fine, but this?

“Genji,” Mercy turned to the younger Shimada, “We aren’t sure how we’re going to go about recruitment. We’re waiting on Lúcio to get here to talk it out. Your brother is welcome, of course.” Here, her voice got thinner. “If you vouch for him and are his escort while on base, but… Genji.” A tone softer. “Are you sure?”

“This will set things right, I am sure of it.” Genji replied. McCree watched as Hanzo gave his brother an incredulous look, then huffed and looked away. He crossed his arms over his chest. McCree mimicked the motion. Oh, lord help him if they were left in a room together, they were gonna have _words_. Genji looked ready to leave. “I will stay with him. Do you need help in the medbay?”

Yes she did, but she answered, “No thank you, McCree and I have it covered. Why don’t you go introduce him to Zenyatta and the others?”

“Yes, we were headed to my room next. And will we handle the rooming situation at a later time?”

“Yes, Genji. Once Lúcio arrives we can speak about… the recruitment process for all three. For now, we wait.” The smile never left her face.

What on God’s green earth.

Genji nodded, gave another small bow, gave McCree a wave of acknowledgment, and rushed his stoic brother down the hall and out of sight. The brother himself hadn’t uttered a word past his self introduction. Once gold and black scarves turned the corner, Jesse rounded on Angela.

“He brought him here?!” He whisper-yelled just as Angela turned around and hissed, “Why didn’t you tell me he-!” and then stopped mid-sentence.

“Oh. You didn’t know either?” She blinked up at him.

“Who the fuck let that asshole in? Genji was with us up… until… Lena and....”

“Mei.” Angela finished for him. They both groaned.

“Athena. Is there any way you could keep an eye on Genji and his brother? With Zenyatta there as well, I can’t worry much...but…”

“I will monitor and alert you if I detect any trouble, Agent Mercy.” Athena answered from the speakers all around the room.

“Thank you.”

She stepped out into the hallway and McCree followed her, cursing not-so-quietly. They fumed until they made it to the safety and solitude of the dusty medbay. Angela made a beeline for the cleaning supplies and Jesse started pulling off and folding sheet covers. She returned, handed him a bottle of disinfectant and a rag and Jesse couldn’t hold his tongue any longer.

“We can’t let him join.” he grit out as he set to work wiping glass cases.

“Jesse, this is Genji’s choice.” Angela was scrubbing diligently at a spot on a countertop.

“Like hell it is! He don’t get to choose who we let in! Plus, he already brought that sensei of his! His plus one is already spoken for!”

“McCree, you agreed with Mei. We need more people.” She brandished a sponge at him.

“We need more people to help save the world, Angie! I dunno about you, but he don’t seem the type.” He waved his bottle of disinfectant.

“You’re letting your bias cloud your judgement!”

“I’ve formed an opinion based on solid fact, thank you very much.”

“Jesse.” Angela stopped her assault on the stain, “If Genji believes this will lead to reconciliation with the only family he has left, we cannot get in the middle of it. It is not our place.” She scolded him. “But… we cannot let our guard down. If he doesn’t seem… repentant…”

“If he so much as touches that bow a’ his while in the same room as Genji he’ll have a bullet lodged in his skull, Mercy. No worries.” He gave her a wink. She scowled.

“That is not what I meant.”

“Then pretend I didn’t say it.”

“Jesse.”

“Angie.”

“Please. We’re together again. I do not want these sorts of problems this early on. We must trust that Genji knows what he is doing.” She sounded so worn out, he couldn’t help but feel bad. McCree walked over to her and put his hands on her shoulders, rubbing circles into her stiff back. He knew what buttons to press, so to speak. She relaxed into his touch, but then he had to go and ruin it.

“That’s a lot to put on faith given the asshole’s track record.”

“Jesse!” She stepped away and turned to glare at him. Childhood friends. Buttons. McCree raised his hands in surrender.

“Speakin’ of new recruits…” He leaned back against a gurney, quickly straightened when it began to roll away and pretended he totally meant for that to happen. Angela laughed at him. McCree raised an eyebrow, gave her a smile, and innocently asked, “Fareeha?” He didn’t even pretend not to smirk at Angela’s sudden blush.

“She… she’s working for Helix now. She wants to join us, but needs to make sure they find a suitable replacement for her before she leaves. She’s dedicated to her work.”

“So y’all kept in touch? Despite someone’s idea that we, now, how did you put it? ‘Void all communications so we don’t give the UN further reason to monitor us?’” McCree put on a high falsetto to copy Angela’s righteous tones. Angela frowned, and caught on to the hurt Jesse had tried to hide.

“I’m sorry, Jesse.”

He pushed thoughts of long empty highways and weeks of solitude to the side and ruffled her hair, earning himself a light punch to the gut. “Oof! Angie, you know I’m just screwin’ with ya. Y’all’re good for each other.”

“It’s not like that.” Mercy replied softly.

“Not yet it ain’t.” McCree waggled his brows. Another punch. This one was harder.

“So, have you managed to rope someone in yet, cowboy?” She asked.

McCree spun the disinfectant bottle in his hand, popped a “Nope!” and got back to work. The only sound to fill the dusty medbay was the whining drag of his rag against glass and the _scritch scritch_  of Angela’s sponge. They were both thinking too hard about unpleasant things, Jesse could tell. The air buzzed with the quiet of their unspoken worries and concerns. Silence between them and the others, he could handle. But silence between him and the bright eyed girl that would come crying to him on quiet nights in the old Swiss headquarters because she had failed to save a life, well. That was just unacceptable.

He began humming a tune in an attempt to lighten the mood. An old song they’d come together to sing back in the days of mission success parties and light hearted laughter. Talking about champions, friendship, heavily doused with epic air guitar riffs courtesy of Gabe and himself. When bad mistakes were the thing of an unexpected future. _Heroes never die._

Angela heard him and began humming along.

One thing led to another, Angela was performing a dance number with a duster and Athena interrupted as McCree slid across shining linoleum, boots forgotten at the foot of the door, using the spray bottle as a microphone.

“Agent McCree.” Athena’s voice rang out around them. McCree stumbled to a stop, slipping with only his socks on. “There is a helicopter bordering our barriers requesting the right to enter. Agent Tracer reported it, I have alerted Winston, and he referred me to you.” She commandeered use of a powered down computer screen to show them a security footage cam’s visual on a bright green helicopter.

McCree and Mercy looked at each other, then at the screen, and then to the open window, from where they could faintly hear excited yelling coming all the way from outside.

“Well wouldya look at that. He’s early.”

* * *

 

Lúcio Correia dos Santos grew up in a poor favela in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It was an area that got hit the worst in the economic aftermath of the omnic crisis. He grew up playing music with other raggedy kids in the streets, using scrap metal as percussion instruments and refurbished equipment as turntables. Singing and smiling took the edge off of hunger and despair.

The years passed, and things didn’t get better for his people, but Lúcio went on to play in underground shows. He could make people happy there, doing what he did. He liked tinkering with gadgets whenever he managed to get his hands on them, and he managed to get his hands on some pretty nice ones when Vishkar decided it had gone to Brazil to stay. Don’t mind where he got a hold of them, but he turned them into weapons. He then used his love of music and programming to free his people from what could only be described as brainwash.

That he got a record label deal out of the whole mess is nothing big, really.

Following a few more altercations with the Vishkar Corporation, however, put his contracting company in a tight position. Lucio was good for sales, amazing for press, but he was technically breaking the law each time cameras caught that telltale flash of green in one of Vishkar’s compounds.

So, after Lena and Winston had made the news securing Doomfist’s gauntlet and whispers about a new Overwatch started circulating, Lúcio put out a not-so-subtle social media post asking Overwatch if they were maybe looking for new recruits, and if he would be welcomed.

McCree liked him immediately. Which is why he barreled out of the Watchpoint days ago to yell at the media drones hovering outside that of course Overwatch would take him. Lena, Reinhardt, and Winston had returned a few hours later, then Genji and his teacher, and finally Angela.

Then Mei and that goddamn excuse for Genji’s family.

And then the star himself.

He jumped out of the helicopter before it could completely make its landing and rolled over to the gathered party on his neon skates. His gradient dreadlocks flying wild in the gust the helicopter picked up. He took in the sight of all nine of them and the still sparking carcasses of the media drones behind them, (one which still had Reinhardt’s hammer imbedded in its side) and gave a happy laugh.

“ _Olá_ Overwatch! I am sorry if my coming caused a fuss. I will help clean the mess!” [1]

“Not a problem, love. Welcome to Gibraltar!” Lena had to yell to be heard over the sound of the helicopter. A suited man started pulling large green luggage trunks out from the helicopter, deposited them on the ground, and just like that they were gone. Lúcio waved at them merrily as the helicopter vanished behind a line of trees, and then turned back to face the team.

“ _Willkommen_ , young Lúcio!” Boomed Reinhardt, stepping forward and clasping a big hand around Lúcio’s shoulder and giving him a light shake. “I have heard of the great things you have done for your people! It will be an honor to have you join the team!”[2]

“Aw thanks, man! Wait a sec. Aren’t you the- whoa! You’re the knight! Man you gotta show me your shield! I can do a thing with my amp that kinda keeps the baddies at bay, but yours is so much better!”

Reinhardt gave a hearty laugh and gave Lúcio a light pat to the back. Lúcio’s knees almost gave out and he was pushed towards the rest of the group. Meanwhile, Reinhardt walked over and with a little repositioning and calculation, picked up all four big trunks by himself and went to wait by the open door.

There was a rising wave of excitement, and everyone shouted a welcome in their home tongues. Lúcio gave a sheepish laugh and rubbed the back of his head. He thanked each of them in turn, then he reached McCree and his eyes widened. After he got his thank you, McCree gave a laugh at the awestruck ‘ _cowboy_ ’ he saw silently form on the his mouth.

“Howdy.” He laughed and tipped his hat. Lucio gave an excited whoop. Genji snickered from behind him. Lúcio spotted Genji and Zenyatta and rushed over to get a closer look.

“Aw man, Overwatch has omnics now too? That’s awesome, yo! I am so pumped! Like, you can’t even begin to understand! This is the dream! I am more than honored to be here man, this is gonna be great!”

While Lúcio gushed about how cool everybody looked and how they were all going to be heroes, Jesse heard a soft sound, not quite a sigh, more like a heavy exhale through the nose. Completely disapproving. The brother. Everyone turned and headed for the doors and McCree used that as an excuse to get a better look at the only one that wasn’t smiling.

Well, save Zenyatta and Genji, but he knew they would be if they could. Heck, the omnic’s faceplate could be seen as a serene smile, what with the flickering lights and all. They were chatting with the newbie all friendly-like. Amiable.

Hanzo Shimada looked to be the exact opposite of amiable. Hanzo’s back was tense, mouth clamped in a tight frown, and his gaze kept flickering from one person to the next, dislike and distrust painfully evident.

Was it just him, or was he not the only one giving the guy suspicious looks? Winston seemed on alert, and Reinhardt looked conflicted when their eyes accidentally met. McCree wondered exactly how well those introductions had gone. Hanzo, on the other hand, disregarded everything and silently followed after his brother.

What a goddamn peach.

They filed back in the briefing room. Winston took the seat at the head of the table… or.. Heh, he took the seat, pushed it to the side, and sat on his haunches at the head of the table. Mercy to his right, Reinhardt took the space of two to his left. McCree pulled the chair next to Angela out and offered it to Mei with a wink and a purred “Ma’am”. She giggled, smacked his arm and took the seat. He sat down next to her. Lena sat across from him, Genji next to her, and his two charges next to him.

Lúcio took the empty chair next to McCree, and then they were all seated. Seated, and waiting expectantly.

Winston coughed. “So. We’re here to discuss how we’re going to go about recruitment. Back when Overwatch was sanctioned by the UN, there was a long application process, forms to fill, recommendations and such. Now, well… We don’t have the resources or the time. All three of you have the backing of at least one current Overwatch member, and no outstanding affiliations with current terrorist or enemy organizations. Taking time restraints into account, my suggestion is as simple as ‘we like you, we keep you.’ Thoughts?”

He was met with silence. Nervously, Winston cleared his throat and went on.

“Okay. We’ll give Lúcio, Zenyatta, and Hanzo a trial run of a month. If we see they work well with us and perform up to standard in mission simulations, I’ll have Athena put them in the system as the official first recruits of the new Overwatch.”

Lúcio gave a relieved sigh. “That easy then? Well then, audio medic in the house! Gotta heal up? I’m your man!” He earned a few smiles and grateful laughs. Jesse only had eyes for the surely Shimada across from him that hadn’t stopped glaring a hole through the wood of the table. He felt his blood begin to boil. He wasn’t gonna allow this.

“And we sure appreciate that, pardner.” He made sure to reassure Lúcio first with a grin. “But are those the only requirements now, Winston? Seems pretty relaxed, compared to the hell we had to go through before.” He threw out casually.

“McCree.” Angela saw right through him. Childhood friends.

“Back then, we hadda do physicals.” Buttons.

“I’d be happy to provide-” Mercy tried to rein him in. Her soothing tone wasn’t working. He was too wound up, remembering a night on a roof and Genji’s quiet, angry, confession. He stared directly at the brother.

“Interviews, training, aptitude tests.”

“McCree, we do not have the resources or the time. If Talon is on the move again-”

“Background checks.” He cut Winston off. He let his voice ring heavy with implication. The glare had lifted from the table and leveled at him. McCree didn’t let off, and continued right on looking.

“McCree, my friend, speak plainly if you must.” Reinhardt’s voice was unnaturally subdued and tinged with concern.

“I’m sayin’ that maybe there’s one person sittin’ at this table that don’t deserve the chance y’all are willin’ to give, and I don’t mean the omnic. God knows he’s more than welcome here!”

“McCree.” Winston’s soft call carried a warning. Everyone was looking at him. Jesse didn’t let himself look at Genji. Hanzo’s eyes cut like a blade, straight through him, anger palpable through the few feet between them.

“Do you have something to say to me, fool?” he asked quietly. The venom in his voice made Jesse’s mouth curl in a grimace.

“I have a few things to say, you son of a-”

“McCree!” Angela stood up.

“Now I know better than anyone that Overwatch gives second chances to even the ugliest folk, but come on Winston! Him?” McCree stood up too, and slammed his hands on the tabletop for good measure.

Reinhardt raised his hands and motioned for him to sit down. “McCree, you should know better. Hanzo’s past with the Shimada-gumi is not enough to revoke him. Genji has testified that he is a changed man! He deserves the same chance you were given!”

That was the last straw. How dare they compare him to the son of a bitch that had willingly committed fratricide? McCree growled and swung his metal arm in Hanzo’s direction. “He killed his own brother!”

Silence rang in the previously thunderous briefing room.

“McCree.” Genji’s tone was graver than he had ever heard it. McCree let himself turn his head to look at him and sucked in a breath, immediately repentant. Genji had a hand on Hanzo’s shoulder, trying and failing to keep him in his seat. The murderous expression on Hanzo’s face however, almost convinced him it had been worth it. That, and the fact Genji had also stopped him from reaching for the bow at his back. He wished he hadn’t. Peacekeeper hung heavy against his hip.

“Enough.” Genji said, as if reading his thoughts. McCree slowly sat back down. Genji pushed, and Hanzo followed his example.

“I've gone and stepped in it now haven't I?” He let his voice sound genuinely sorry. He almost was. “Sorry.”

A gasp came from next to him when Lúcio connected the dots. “Shit, I thought he was an omnic. My bad, man.”

Genji waved a hand at him, forgiving him without words.

The silence was heavy, and horrified. Lena’s eyes were wide, Mei was muttering in Chinese, Mercy was shaking her head at him, Reinhardt looked sad, Winston didn’t seem to know how to gain back control of the room. McCree tried not to feel grim satisfaction. But even the expressionless Zenyatta seemed to be disapproving of his outburst, if that agitated humming noise was anything to go on.

This time, it was Genji that stood. “Accusations notwithstanding,” Genji turned his head sharply to look at McCree through his visor, “My past with my brother is my own, and what happened between us is of no concern to anyone but us. Despite that, I still vouch for him, and firmly believe that his skills would benefit the team. I request he be given the same trial period and treatment as our other recruits. Winston?”

“Uh, I, um-” Winston gave a snort, shook his head, and looked up to address the table. “I will respect your decision, Genji. Uh, that is, if there are no objections?”

This time, Angela’s look coupled with Genji’s did its trick, and McCree didn’t say a word.

“Alright. A month. We’ll see after that if you all have what it takes to join the team permanently. For now, welcome to Overwatch! If you’ll report to Athena, she’ll assign you a temporary personnel  code to the training rooms and other accessible areas and give you your room number and-”

McCree tuned Winston out. He slouched in his seat, hat tipped over his face, silently fuming. For all he teased Angela, he knew he also had an overprotective streak a mile wide. Anger was boiling in his gut. Genji was naive. He didn’t care what he had learned in his stint in Nepal with Zenyatta. There was no way a man did what his brother did and then just-

Just what? Why was Hanzo even here? Hoping to turn a new leaf? Let bygones be bygones? McCree snorted.

There was movement, the sound of chairs pushed back and then scraping along the floor as they were pushed back in under the table. Voices, Tracer’s chronal accelerator, the door opening and closing, Athena’s calm tones and the receding click of Angela’s heels. McCree took that as his cue to leave.

He didn’t make it five feet out the door before an angry voice rang through the hall.

 _"Omae!”_ Deep, overbearing, and resounding through the hall with his lordly tone. [3]

Oh, here we go.

He stopped, took what he hoped was a calming breath, and slowly turned to face the tiger.

 _Or the dragon_ , Jesse mused, for how fluidly the man moved. He almost seemed to glide. He and Genji had that in common. Hanzo Shimada made no noise as he stalked angrily towards him. Jesse looked down to see-

Prosthetics.

Huh.

“Who are you?”

Strange opening line. McCree blinked, having expected something nastier.

“Uh… Jesse McCree.” He tipped his hat out of habit, and a bit out of a sense of displacement. The archer’s presence was… unsettling.

A sharp exhale of frustration. “No. Who are you, to speak of such things? Genji told me he had told no one. How did you know?”

“Uh... “ All eloquence, today. “He kinda did tell me. That’s how I know. People do that, y’know. Talk.”  

Hanzo considered him with narrowed eyes. McCree tried to keep his own eyes on his face.

“You have no right.” Not unsettling, distracting. From the way he held himself, to the way he tipped his head back, shorter than him but still managing to look down his nose at him. Long, corded, graceful neck. The curve of biceps holding his arms crossed against his chest. McCree felt anger spike again.

“The hell with you, I have every right!”

“You foolishly speak of things you neither know nor understand! If you-”

“Excuse you, sweetie, I’d reckon it’s you who don’t have the right to-”

“Do not interrupt me!” Indignant, nigh spitting fire in his face. McCree took a step back to better look at him. “If you did, you would know that I am not here by choice! This... this,” he glowered, “Overwatch is how he believes we will achieve true reconciliation. I only wish to attempt to atone for what I did to him. No one else has any say in his decision.” The way he snarled, McCree would bet his hat Hanzo was fighting the urge to pull that pretty bow on him.

“You only wish to atone?” McCree repeated, eyebrows raised. “For what ya did to him?”

“Yes.”

“And you think I believe that?! Pfft, nah.” McCree brought himself to his full height, staring down at him, brows furrowed, mouth set in a tight frown, beyond angry. Disgusted. “You’re so full of shit yer eyes are- oh. Huh. Your eyes’re actually brown. Well I’ll be.” He deflated a bit, then just gave a tired sigh. “ _Sabes que,_ I won’t say nothin’. It ain’t my place. If Genji-kun is alright with you stayin’, then what I think don’t matter.” [4]

Jesse gave the elder Shimada one last glare for good measure. Then he tipped his hat again, gave him a gruff, “Welcome to the team.” and walked off. He didn’t turn to see his reaction, and the sound of his spurs would’ve covered any non-existent sound of footsteps behind him, so he considered that over and done with. 

Then he turned the corner and walked straight into 5 feet 9 inches of plated metal and winced.

Oh no.

“Oh no.”

“McCree.” Zenyatta was nowhere in sight. Genji’s voice held none of the calm it exuded whenever his master was present.

“Now don’t you ‘McCree’ me, mister. I know when I’ve done wrong. I said I was sorry.”

“Then what was that?” Genji nodded down the hall.

“Er…”

“McCree, I do not need you to defend me.”

“Genji-kun, I know you’ve forgiven him an’ all, but that don’t mean I gotta like it.”

“My brother is antagonizing enough as it is, please do not make it easier for him to find a reason to shoot you.”

“Oh I’d love to see him try, teach him a thing or two-”

“McCree.” Genji’s voice turned soft, tired. Pleading, even. Jesse ran a hand over his face, then tugged at his beard.

“Alright, alright. I’ll give the man a chance. Is that what you want from me?” He sighed in defeat.

“After what just happened, I doubt he will find the atmosphere to be very inviting.” Genji said accusingly. McCree winced again. “I was hoping to keep our history a secret. I didn’t want everyone’s first impression of him to be jaded. He did an awful thing, but his hand was forced, and he is repentant. He does not deserve to live the rest of his life with everyone reminding him of his mistakes. He is a good man, I promise.”

“Sure, bud.”

“I am being serious. Give him more than a chance. Make up for the rift you have just created between him and everyone else.”

“Aw, come on Genji-kun, you don’t mean-”

“Yes, I do.” Genji was staring him down. Odd thing, seeing as he was shorter by a few inches.

Jesse was never going to win a staring contest against Genji.

“Aw, hell.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was drunk and listening to Bad Blood by TSwift when I wrote this it was all very dramatic.  
>   
> [1]Hello  
> [2]Welcome (thank u Orangebubble)  
> [3]'You' but very informal and rude. Said to people below oneself. Hanzo is totes being a butt  
> [4]You know what?


	4. Making Acquaintances

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a slow chapter- things pick up in the next one but for now, may i remind you that i love genji and i love mei
> 
> See end notes for translations.

“You are angry.”  

An understatement. What he was experiencing went beyond that.

Genji walked through the doorway of his room and slid the door shut behind him. Athena had brought this wing of the dormitories online after assigning the new recruits an adjacent hallway to the veterans. Hanzo had been assigned room 019. Across the hall from the omnic and next to the music idol.

The room itself was small, but decent for a lone agent. Roughly thirteen square meters, furnished with a bed frame, on top of which was a plastic sheet covered extra long twin sized mattress. There was a bedside table, a desk pushed off to the side equipped with a computer system and a single padded wooden chair. On the desk was a neat pile of folded bedding, colored a soft grey. There were two doors on the right side of the room. One revealed a sizeable closet and chest of drawers, the other a small but serviceable bathroom.

A long, narrow window traversed the entirety of the opposite wall. There was no curtain, but there were blinds.

The floor was grey tile. He wasn’t sure if that was the actual color, or if it looked that way because of the heavy layer of dust that had settled over everything in the room. Only the recently placed bedclothes seemed clean.

Hanzo had taken one look at the state of what was to be his room and walked back out in search of a broom, a rag, and a bucket.

The tile floor turned out to be white.

Cleaning bots were currently scouring the hallways, sweeping away dust and cobwebs. There was music thumping through the wall, a steady beat that did nothing to soothe Hanzo’s temper.

“I spoke with McCree. He will put things to rights again. The others are kind and understanding. They are less likely to hold a grudge.”

The anger he felt was directed inward, outward, at anything or anyone that was unlucky enough to commit the crime of simply existing where Hanzo only longed for solitude. To sling accusatory words his way and expect to get a rise out of him. They had the right to hold a grudge. The cowboy had had the right to call him out in front of everyone. Hanzo’s pride had simply refused to acknowledge that truth in the heat of the moment. Now, however, he was keenly aware of what a future here would mean for him. He was accustomed to solitude. Desired it, even.

He couldn’t get Mei’s horror-stricken look out of his head.

He shook his head and scrubbed at the tile floor harder.

“Zenyatta wishes to speak with you.”

A scoff. “I do not wish to speak with him.”

“He has taught me much. I am sure his counseling would help ease your mind.”

Hanzo tossed the rag back into the bucket, creating a small splash. He sat seiza and looked up at his brother, the thing that was now his brother, and had to look away. He took the rag up again, rung it out, and resumed his cleaning.

“Look, if you hate it here so much after the month is over, I won’t force you to join.”

That got his attention. He kept his eyes down, but asked, _“Naze?”_ [1]

Genji moved to stand by the window, his back to him, considering the view.

“The world is changing, _onī-chan_. I told you this before. I may be a fool, as you say, but I am not blind. I cannot force you to pick a side you do not believe in, and Overwatch deserves loyalty. I see the way you look at me. The way I am now is a reminder of our past. I understand if you do not wish to stay here.”

“I wish no such thing.”

Genji turned. “You’re reluctant to even look at me, _onī-chan_ , don’t try to tell me you don’t find my resemblance to an omnic distasteful.”

“It is not that.” Hanzo muttered, eyes trained on the floor.

“No? Then what is it? Why do you refuse to look at me?”

It was the fact that he was the reason his brother was the way he now was. The fact that a large part of him didn’t even truly believe the automaton in front of him was his brother. His brother had been brash, free-spirited, and angry. Disagreeing with him at every turn and making running a criminal empire with a modicum of decorum all but impossible. His brother was dead.

When the family had tried to give Genji a portion of the burden that had fallen on Hanzo’s shoulders, he had taken it only to twist his orders, displace profits, and laugh at the mess he left in his wake. The fox didn’t give up its wiles. The sparrow had no love for the family that tried to cage it.

No. That was a lie. Genji had always loved Hanzo. When the day was over and the dockets were seen to, paperwork signed, threats made and followed through, and assignments given, it was easier to ignore their titles. Genji had been the same carefree boy that always managed to make Hanzo laugh despite the severity of the reality that existed around them. Even if the next day Hanzo turned around and laid into him viciously, claiming that they were far from equals, that Genji was a shame to the family, and was nothing but a hindrance. Genji had loved his big brother.

He didn’t give Genji an answer. Genji sighed at his silence, walked to stand in front of him, and lightly kicked the bucket aside to get his attention.

_"Jaa, bu otoko no otouto de warukatta na."_ [2]

The comment was said so gravely, and it was so out of place that it shocked a laugh out of Hanzo. Genji made a satisfied sound, then dropped to a crouch to look him straight in the eye. There was an importance to the simple move. The reason why Hanzo had not risen to greet his brother had not escaped Genji. This new Genji was quick to put them back on the same level.

“I will not force anything else on you. If you wish to spend the month hidden away in this room, I won’t stop you. I simply ask that you try, for my sake. Some of these people have….” Genji paused, reluctant to voice his thought. He reached out a hand to take a hold of Hanzo’s shoulder, and finished. “They have become like family, Hanzo. They could be the same for you.”

Hanzo bit back an angry retort about how he didn’t need a second family, and Genji didn’t either. But he had, hadn’t he? Genji’s family had left him for dead. If these people had been good to him, then Hanzo did not only owe a debt to Genji, but to them as well. He pushed Genji’s hand away.

“Who?” he asked, before he could change his mind. Genji gave a hum.

“Angela-sama was the one that saved me.” A robotic laugh, hiding an embarrassed tone. “As a result, she likes to mother me. She’s around your age, however, I believe.” His voice turned reverent. “She is the voice of calm in a storm, the best medic I have ever met, even better than the ones the family employed. She truly cares for her patients. She deserves respect.” He coughed, out of habit more than necessity, and his voice went back to its usual offhand tone. “Reinhardt is always welcoming, you will see that soon enough. He has soul for adventure and a big heart. Lena will befriend anything, so watch your back. As for McCree… he means well.”

“You told me that no one knew.” Hanzo tried to keep his voice from sounding accusing.

“Honestly? I forgot I told him.” Careless sparrow. Another laugh. “I have told him many things, it is difficult to keep track of them all. But I remember, now.”

He said it fondly, a different emotion in his voice than when he spoke of the doctor. Hanzo wondered what the relationship between Genji and the infuriating cowboy was.

Genji answered the question without him having to ask. “He is a good friend of mine. Do not let your first impression tarnish any future interactions between the two of you. He is a good man. I trust him completely.”

If Overwatch had become Genji’s family, then it was plain to see who had replaced Hanzo in the role of brother. There was unrestrained sentiment in Genji’s voice. Hanzo had not felt jealousy in many years. It stung now, burrowing itself in his chest. He had no right to feel it. He disregarded it. Genji went on, none the wiser.

“When I joined, I was angry. Angry at the family, angry at you… I was even angry at Angela-sama for what she did to help me. I just wanted to bring down our clan and end it all. Everyone coddled me, gave me pity I didn’t want. Everyone except McCree. He took one look at me, whistled, and said that I looked like something straight out of an anime. He talked about those silly classics you can still see in arcades. _Kamen Raidaa. Shitteru?”_ [3]

Hanzo gave a grunt of affirmation.

“Everyone else, they made a point to not point out what I was. Perhaps they thought it polite not to ask. I hated it. Angela-sama didn’t; she made me, after all. But the rest? I was flesh and bone to them and my experience was… nothing. All that I went through, swept under a rug and avoided.”

“McCree didn’t ask, but I told him. He is the only one who knew, outside of those that made the executive decision to pick me up from where you left me for dead and save my life. But three of them are dead and gone, and Angela-sama wouldn’t share my story with her patient confidentiality.” He stopped, dropped all the way to the floor and crossed his legs to sit more comfortably. “That is the reason why he went after you the way he did. He means well, but he does not know you, and he did not have the right. I have spoken to him. He will make things right between you both.”

They stared at one another. They had been doing that a lot since reunited. Eyes drinking their fill of one another, making up for lost time. Hanzo more so, trying to convince his mind that the thing in front of him was no thing, no trick. It was his brother. Less flesh and bone than he remembered, but it was Genji nonetheless. The silence was uncomfortable. He had to force down the lump that came to his throat when he thought too hard about everything. Hanzo wondered if silence between them would ever be comfortable again.

He sighed. “I suppose I can do that much. I will attempt to be civil.”

“He can get pretty annoying, though. Please don’t shoot him. He will shoot you back.”

Hanzo let out a snort. “I saw that gun of his, I doubt he is able to do much damage with that archaic thing.”

There was a grin in the sound of Genji’s voice. “You would be surprised, _onī-chan._ He is a great marksman, perhaps just as good as you.” An idea visibly popped into his head. He scampered to his feet. “ _Ne,_ do you want to find out?”[4]

_"....What?”_

“Find out who the better marksman is! Athena got the training ranges up and running a few days ago. Winston said he uploaded various mission simulations on the target range. McCree is just a comm call away.” He tapped at the side of his head, mimicking a comm link. “I’ll tell him to meet us there.” Genji made that motion again, excitable, hopping on the balls of his feet.

“No.”

“Come on, Hanzo! Or are you afraid the American cowboy will outshoot you?”

“I do not want to spend more time around that caricature than necessary, Genji. He has made his dislike known, and I feel no need to experience any of his thinly veiled scorn. Despite your assurances, I don’t believe he will find being civil as easily as you would like to believe.”

“Give him a chance!”

“No. I must finish cleaning if this is where I am to sleep tonight.”

A sigh. “If you say so. Will you at least come to dinner tonight? I think Reinhardt said he would be making some sort of meat stew? And Angela-sama’s here, so there’s sure to be healthier options, if you still prefer them.”

“No, that won’t be necessary.”

“You cannot be a hermit forever, and you can’t have enough food in that pack you brought along to last you.” he nodded pointedly at the small backpack resting against the far wall.

“I will manage.”

A frustrated noise. Genji gave up and made his way to the door. “Zenyatta’s invitation still stands, for whenever you feel ready to accept it.”

“I will not.”

But Genji was already gone. And he hadn’t closed the door behind him, the little shit.

Hanzo finally stood to go close it.

* * *

 

An hour passed, then another, and then every surface of his new room gleamed. He put his cleaning supplies back where he had found them.

For lack of anything better to do, he went back to his room and began putting up what meager possessions he had.

There was a knock at his door. After a quick check to make sure his room was orderly, Hanzo made his way over, ready to deny the omnic or welcome his brother. But opening it revealed the cowboy.

He hadn’t gotten past a cursory look the last time they had met. The thought struck him that he recognized him from the newscast he saw while searching for Genji in Bangladesh. Another memory fluttered in the back of his mind, but he quickly disposed of it. There was no way he had seen such a man before. He would have remembered.

The wild beard, unkempt brows, and wide mouth weren’t easy to forget. The only difference from the newscast was that the cowboy wasn’t smiling now. There he was, like something plucked straight from one of the Westerns Japanese evening comedy programs would play snippets of to mock something or another. A segment after reruns of _Musashi._ Complete with a leather holster carrying what looked to be an ancient refurbished silver revolver. An excessively tanned American cowboy, draped in a ridiculous frayed bright red- blanket? Cloak?- that would give him away in a second on the battlefield. That is, if the stupid spurs jingling on his boots didn’t manage to do so first. And the hat. How exactly did that hat serve any purpose? They were hardly stationed under a grueling desert sun. Was his costume just that? A costume?

He wore a long-sleeved button-down brown shirt that looked as if it had been a different color long ago. The right sleeve was rolled up at the elbow, and peeking out beneath the red cloak was a bronze chest plate, lazily gleaming blue at the link junctions. The same blue light lit up spots of his matching prosthetic. A skull glared at him from just below the elbow. Leather pants and chaps clung to long, muscled legs, and Hanzo brought his gaze back up to his face.

He was tall, Hanzo realized with a pang of annoyance. Almost a head taller than himself. He had to crane his neck up to look him in the eye. Eyes that were a slight, muddy brown. Who had he been to comment on Hanzo’s own eye color? His were only a few shades lighter.

Jesse McCree was standing straight, bold as day, with one hand shoved in his back pocket and his metal forearm lifting a cigarillo from his frowning lips. Right behind him was a plaque bearing the image of a cigarette crossed out by a big red circle with a line through it.

“This is a non-smoking hallway.”

“It ain’t lit, Captain Obvious.” the cowboy drawled. Breathing a little heavily. He was winded, there was a light sheen of sweat on his brow and what he could see of his flesh arm. It seemed Genji had taken the man out for practice despite Hanzo’s refusal.

A pause. Both of them assessing the other. Neither looking too keen on making it a conversation.

“What do you want?” He wanted him gone.

“Genji asked me to come fetch you fer supper.” He seemed just as unhappy about being there as Hanzo was to have to be in his presence.

“I told him I would not be in attendance.” Hanzo said.

The cowboy frowned at him, confusion and annoyance fighting for dominance over his wild features. “So what? Y’gonna starve?”

He wished that they would stop asking him questions. “I will not.”

“Sweetie, don’t let what I think get in the way of gettin’ to know the others.”

“That is no concern of mine. I do not care what you think. And do not call me that.” He let his voice be cruel. He wanted this encounter over with.

The cowboy, it seemed, didn’t care either. He leaned his weight against the doorframe, effectively putting himself against the door so that Hanzo would be unable to shut it on him. “Listen, Genji told me to behave, and I’m tryin’ here. We don’t gotta be friends, but ya can’t just spend all yer time holed up in here. The rooms don’t even come equipped for tv’s. I know, I asked.”

“I have no need for a… television.”

“Humans ain’t meant to be solitary creatures, Shimada-san.” An idea struck. “Mei seems to like you, lord knows why. She’s a nice girl, don’t let that go sour.”

Why was he being given advice on how to go about his social life?

“Are you done?” he growled.

The cowboy straightened and took a step back. Hanzo gripped the door, ready to slam it shut.

“I see Genji didn’t give ya the same advice he gave me. Alright, I reckon I’ve met my courtesy quota for the day.”

He made to depart by stepping back once more and turning around. Hanzo began to slide his door shut.

“Just so you know, the kitchen is free to use. Most everyone’s outta there after supper ‘round 1900. Everything’s up for grabs, and given how much Reinhardt and Lena cook, well, there’s a lot of leftovers in the freezer room. Careful what you grab, though. Them Europeans like some weird shit sometimes. Unless y’don’t mind blood pudding.” His voice was strained, but gentle. Trying on friendly like an ill-fitting pair of shoes. But Hanzo could tell that it was genuine.

He didn’t look back as he spoke. Hanzo felt something fleeting, like remorse. He briefly considered calling out a thank you. His doubt was swiftly overshadowed by vexation. McCree left, and Hanzo didn’t slide the door all the way shut.

Hanzo watched him leave, and the silhouette of McCree against the soft yellow lights of the hallway brought the elusive memory to the forefront of his mind.

A calm evening in a quiet bar in Kyoto, a few days before he made his way to Hanamura for his annual penance. The news showing on a small projector propped on the highest shelf along with the good sake and brandy.

A cowboy causing a ruckus in the heart of Japan. In a noodle shop he and Genji had frequented in their youth, no less. He had scoffed into his glass and looked down before he caught sight of a then unfamiliar green figure intercepting the cowboy in his escape before the camera careened off into the busy street.

* * *

 

The day dragged on and turned into night. After the room was clean and the mattress unwrapped and put back on the metal bedstand, there was little to do other than malinger. And staying idle in his room for the sole purpose of avoiding the others was bordering on pathetic. Hanzo had to admit that what the cowboy had said had its merits. He left his room right as 2000 rolled around. He thanked Genji in his mind for the quick tour of the base he had been given earlier during their round of introductions. As the cowboy had said, the kitchen and its adjoining dining hall were empty.

Inside he found a well-loved oven, a recently wiped down line of stove tops, and one banged-up microwave. A nearly empty fruit bowl was placed precariously atop of a pile of cookbooks. A big industrial-sized dishwasher had duct tape pasted over it, spelling out in all capitals “NO.” There was a rice cooker, something he hadn’t expected to find this far west. It was empty, but that was easily resolved after a few minutes of poking around the cupboards. As he waited, he took stock of what was in the kitchen and what else he could use.

A ridiculous amount of beef was stored in the back of the freezer room behind a frosted door, along with a mountain of bags of frozen vegetables, white trays of pork, a box of frozen burritos, a big bag of fried chicken tenders, and a tub of ice cream. There was a tower of tupperware to his waist, all filled with various foodstuffs he couldn’t quite place and a few with sticky notes attached. With dates. How helpful.

Towards the front were fresh vegetables, some chicken, packs of sausages, a bag of small herring, a few mackerel, another tower of tupperware (whose sticky notes bore various names instead), jugs of juice, packs of beer, a lone carton of low-fat milk, a watermelon, and almost as an afterthought, a few clear plastic grocery bags of fruit.

Hanzo took a mackerel. He turned on the oven. There was a long spice rack hanging over the stove tops. Cutting boards leaning against the wall, and knives nestled in their holders. He made use of them.

The kitchen island was half counter top, half sinks. And the sinks were filled to the top with dirty pots and dishes. A paper taped onto an overhead lamp read that it was Lena’s turn tonight.

The pantry revealed far too many brightly colored packages bearing smiling characters and empty promises of nutritional value. Porridge, oatmeal. A few boxes of crackers, a few boxes of instant meals, and altogether too many chips. A lone box of fiber-rich cereal. A loaf of wheat bread. Boxes of plastic forks, spoons, and knives. A bag of wooden chopsticks. He took a pair.

The entire thing looked to be the result of an ill-planned visit to a grocery store, with people throwing into the cart whatever they saw that caught their eye, and little more than that taken into account.

Hanzo had no doubt that scenario had actually taken place. He stood at the center of it all, arms crossed, taking turns between watching the oven and the rice cooker. The rice cooker read 22 minutes. The fish would take just as long.

He could hear loud voices drifting through the hallway, coming from what quick observation and silent feet proved to be some sort of recreation room.

Lena and Lúcio were playing a very colorful (and explosive) game on a screen that took up half the wall in front of the huge, long, brown curving couch positioned in front of it. They were misusing the couch, jumping up and down and shouting abuse at the screen and each other. Judging by the brown hat he could see poking out from the top of the couch and the hands (one organic, one mechanic) that were raised and pushing furiously at the buttons of a handheld controller, McCree was there too.

“That was my last health pack! I’m gonna kill you!” Lúcio shouted in a laugh, shoving at Lena with his shoulder.

“You’ll have to catch me first, mate!” she answered, and the bright green mecha on the top right fraction of the screen collided with a wall just as an orange one on the top left scampered away, leaving the green one in a smoking heap. A red one could be seen lumbering around on the bottom right portion. The blue one on the bottom left didn’t seem to be doing much of anything.

“McCree, man, ya gotta catch up!” Lúcio crowed, swiping the aforementioned cowboy’s hat off his head and placing it atop his own. Now Hanzo could see a mop of messy brown hair.

“You give that-!” McCree sat up and stiffened, then began to turn around. He knew someone was watching them. Hanzo backed down the hall before he could find out who.

He almost made it back to the kitchen when Mei-Ling opened the door to the communal bathrooms and froze him with just a look.

“Hanzo.”

The look was kind.

He didn’t say anything. Just like the last time they faced one another, he did not move. Neither did she. She stood poised in the doorway of the bathroom, in the middle of drying her hands on her pants.

“Where have you been all day?”

A direct question. “Cleaning.” he answered truthfully and carefully.

“We missed you at dinner.” She relaxed, stepped out fully, and halfheartedly began to shake her hands to the sides to rid herself of the last few drops of water. She had taken her coat off, and her drone was not with her. Her hair was out of its bun, and fell in lazy waves around her shoulders. The white muscle shirt she wore was loose and tied to the side, showing a bit of her stomach. She looked completely at ease.

“We?” He ventured to ask.

She nodded. “Yes. We.” She made a broad gesture. “You’re part of the team now, pending the success of mission simulations. Dinner was at 1730. Did nobody tell you?” She looked worried, and a bit upset at herself.

Hanzo shook his head. “Both Genji and…” He paused. The name still sounded foreign in his head, and he had never spoken it aloud before, “Mac...Cree informed me of it, I simply chose not to attend.”

“Why?” He detected no hint of malice, no wariness in her gaze. Just simple concern, as if for a friend. She had her arms crossed in front of her now, and was leaning in towards him.

“Truthfully?” Feeling reckless, Hanzo leaned against the opposite wall and raised an eyebrow at her. “To spare you all an uncomfortable meal.”

“Hanzo.” She chided softly, as if she knew him, as if she had the right. Hanzo found he did not particularly mind. “Your past is just that: the past. No one here can judge you for it, especially not with Genji-kun so happy to have you here.”

He didn’t give her an answer. He couldn’t even bring himself to give her a smile. Hanzo could feel someone watching them. He didn’t have to turn around to know that the cowboy had abandoned his spot on the couch and had gotten up to investigate.

“Yo, Butch Cassidy! You see Mei anywhere out there?” Lúcio’s voice rang loud despite the distance Hanzo had managed to put between him and the rec room.

“...Naw, but y’know you can’t rush a lady.” McCree’s voice got quieter as he went on. A wordless kindness, to allow them this moment of privacy. He went back inside the room, and Mei looked around Hanzo with a puzzled expression. She turned back to Hanzo and seemed to reach a conclusion.

“Come play with us.” She offered.

“No thank you.” He refused.

“Come on, Hanzo. Lúcio and the others are very nice! What happened this morning was a shock, sure, but they’ll come around.”

“You make the mistakes of my past sound trivial.” His tone was accusing.

“Mhmm. You just said it yourself. Mistakes. You’re sorry, right?” She didn’t even give him a chance to answer. “They’ll see that. I’ve only known you a day myself, and I think you’re alright. You’re not a bad guy, Hanzo.” Then, remembering herself, she froze. “Ah! I mean, can I call you Hanzo? Is that okay? Do you prefer Shimada-san, or…?”

Overwatch was an association built by the United Nations composed of only the most brilliant minds and capable fighters, with a few adventurers and oddballs thrown in the mix. From what Mei-Ling had told him, she fell in with the brilliant side of things. But he remembered her gun, her story that she had been out in the wilds testing equipment and weapons. He knew, and yet he had trouble believing that the sweet, unassuming, and level-headed woman before him would be very capable of killing for the sake of a mission.

She was perhaps a little foolish to attempt to befriend him so readily. Foolish like his brother was, head full of daydreams, forgiveness, and hope. Like the cowboy and his reluctant but genuine friendliness. Hanzo thought of them, and decided foolishness seemed to be going around.

“Hanzo is fine. And perhaps some other time.” He said, and meant it. Mei-Ling nodded, and gave him a little wave before she walked off and joined the other three back in the noisy room.

Hanzo heard something begin to beep. He rushed to the kitchen.

* * *

 

McCree walked in just as Hanzo finished putting his clean bowl on the drying rack. He didn’t seem surprised to find him there. He simply walked up to him and politely said, “S’cuse me.”

Hanzo stepped aside to allow him access to the sink, eyed him warily. “Why are you here?”

“Someone’s gotta wash the dishes.” McCree answered as he picked up the sponge and got to work. He started categorizing the dishes. Plates in a pile, silverware in stacked glasses, pots and pans pushed to the side soaking in warm water. Moving one caused the water to slosh over the rim of the sink, and he jumped back to save his shirt a soak.

He had taken off the chest plate, chaps, and cloak. His shirt was unbuttoned low, showing a thick patch of chest hair.

Hanzo let his eyes flicker up to the sheet of paper that was swaying slightly above them. McCree caught him looking and huffed a sigh.

“Lost a bet with Lena.”

Suddenly curious, “A bet?”

“A suicide run. No power-ups, no handicaps, and no special items. Just me an’ her. And me dead on the ground.” He spoke of the game, already knowing Hanzo would know. “She’d already beat Lúcio. Lookin’ back, I shouldn’ta done it, but the stakes were too good not to take the shot.” He ended, suggestive. Curious if Hanzo would take the hint, continue the conversation. Show some _courtesy,_ as he had called it.

“Hm.” Was all Hanzo said. Then he turned and walked out of the kitchen. He wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of taking the bait. That was a step past civility he had no desire or incentive to take.

He heard the sound of the sink being turn on and the subsequent water rushing, just barely unable to cover the cowboy’s quiet huff of irritation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bruh this typhoon ain't fuckin around i haven't seen the sun in days
> 
> [1]Why?  
> [2]Imagine Genji saying this in the most solemn “well soRRY” tone  
> [3]Kamen Rider, you know it? (Kamen Rider is a popular JPN tv program a la Power Rangers but better and also worse)  
> [4]Hey, do you want to find out?  
> 


	5. Combat Laser Tag

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m from Jalisco we call it a _sarape_ not a _serape_ and im stickin to my roots. 
> 
> Shout out to [WhiteNoize33666](http://archiveofourown.org/users/WhiteNoize33666/pseuds/WhiteNoize33666) for making sense of my mess as I, and I quote, “spill your heart out on paper LITERALLY.” That will never not be a gruesome visual.
> 
> See end notes for translations.

Winston and Athena finished priming the Watchpoint security system after a long day and a late night of diligent work. Soon the late night turned into an early morning, and the two reached the indisputable agreement that an improved security system was all well and good, but if they were going to do this, they were going to do it right.

Following an announcement on the intercom, McCree and the rest of the team walked into the mess hall to see a group training schedule posted on the bulletin board next to the trash cans. They went about making their breakfasts while Winston spoke, his voice easily carrying. McCree grabbed an apple off the fruit bowl and filled his cup with coffee. Reinhardt was standing in the fridge. Lena was pouring an insane amount of sugar into her bowl. He’d take it black.

“We are reinstating team practice sessions. The first one will be held today at 1110. Meet in my lab. New recruits need to attend, but will not be taking part. As for the rest of you, we’ll start you off easy. A standard payload mission. Get it from one point to the goal, split in two opposing teams. Let’s see how much work we have ahead of us if we’re going to be going on missions anytime soon.” Winston sat casually at the forefront of the room, sleepily munching on a banana. He nodded at McCree, who stepped over one of his legs to sit down at the nearest table next to Angela. 

“As necessary as training is, the UN will jump on any more Overwatch movement. We are pushing them enough as it is. Going on missions for the sake of missions is not a wise choice.” Angela had to wait until she had swallowed her fruit and yogurt before she could interrupt.

“We will have to act eventually. We’re keeping it on base until the media gets off our backs and, oh I don’t know, pegs this whole thing as a weird five year anniversary reunion.” Winston said hopefully.

“That is unlikely.” Genji almost seemed amused. He walked past McCree’s spot, followed by a floating Zenyatta.

“What brought this on?” Lena piped up, mouth full of porridge as she made her way out of the kitchen doorway and into the room.

“Oh good, someone asked. I didn’t want to have to make some sort of dramatic lead-in.” Winston sighed in relief. He waited for the rest of the team to file in with their various foodstuffs, and he tapped his tablet. The holo attachment started up, fuzzing at the edges, but the video was clear.

 _"The United Nations has not authorized any Overwatch operations. The organization’s charter remains revoked.”_ said an imperious man in a smart black suit standing behind a podium backed by the white pillars and green lawn of the UN office in Geneva. Reporters flocked to him, only held back by surly security guards, all shouting their questions. A drone provided an aerial shot of the whole debacle, and citizens could be seen outside the gates, holding protests signs and hollering up a storm. “ _Rest assured that the United Nations is taking these rogue agents very seriously. As grateful as we are for their intervention, we will not tolerate unsanctioned missions. In light of the severity of the attack on the Memorial, we have opened communications with the former agents, and will alert the public if there is to be any debate concerning the Petras Act. We thank you for your patience.”_  The video flickered, and then the hologram folded back in on itself and disappeared.

“Thanked us, did they?” Lena shook her head, smiling.

“I got an email. A cease and desist, really. The thank you was more of a footnote.” Winston grinned. Then his voice and face turned serious. “The media is another matter. They’re reporting that the people have conflicting opinions on us being back. The Overwatch generation has grown up. They remember us as their childhood heroes, but what happened in the Swiss headquarters is still up in the air. They don’t like not knowing anymore than we do.”

McCree crunched on his apple. He looked at everyone around him. Angela had folded in on herself next to him, as she always did whenever Geneva was mentioned. Lost in thought, unreachable until she made it back out of the maze of her thoughts.

“We have to be prepared for outside attackers if we’re going to be in the spotlight like this. Talon made their move even before we even came back together. There are plenty of groups who called themselves our enemies while we were still on the job. Without us at the forefront they have managed to get a foothold in the underground again, and are thriving. They won’t risk the UN changing its mind and revoking or revising the Act. They’ll try to get rid of us before the world sees that unlikely outcome. We need to be ready.”

Genji sat with Zenyatta at the back of the room. The omnic floated at the corner of the long table pushed against the wall. Genji had pulled the chair far out and straddled it to face the rest of the room.

A few chairs down, his brother was sitting next to Mei-Ling, who was offering him pieces of peeled peach with her heart inlaid chopsticks, which he politely refused. The man himself was eating a bowl of rice topped with something sticky and brown, which Mei had turned her nose up at only a few seconds prior. It seemed he had taken his advice with Mei after all. McCree felt some tension in him let off. Mei knew what she was doing, and she was a good agent. If she had her eyes on him, McCree knew Hanzo wouldn’t be able to get up to no good. Plus, she and Lena came from the same crop. Friendly as can be, but a lot smarter and sharper eyed than they let on.

A few tables down, Reinhardt was eating a mountain of sausages, with salad in a bowl forgotten by his elbow resting on the table. Lena next to him, with her porridge and kippers. Lúcio was eating a piece of toast and coffee.

“That’s well and good that is. But who’ll play commander?” Lena asked, grin on her face, already anticipating the answer.

“Uh, well, I thought I’d do it.” Winston shrugged. The rest of them started piling him with assurances and compliments. If he could, the gorilla would be blushing. He brought their voices back down with a heavy downward wave.

“Now, last order of business. Raise your hand if you can cook.” Winston ordered.

A new dinner duty rotation roster was posted next to the training schedule by the time they filed back out of the room. McCree absentmindedly regretted his decision to stay behind during the grocery run to watch his _novelas._ [1] None of the bastards had brought back any hot sauce, and that rooster shit didn’t count.

* * *

 

Idly, McCree wished he had slept through Athena’s announcement about the breakfast meeting. Then he could have had a valid excuse not to show up for what was sure to be the biggest damn mess to grace the walls of Watchpoint Gibraltar since old Torbjörn tried his hand at cooking. He hadn’t really been practicing other than going it solo, and last night in the practice range with Genji-kun had been more of a _‘I’ll show you mine if you show me yours’_ scenario. Jesse was no good with swords. And he was never going to voice that particular thought.

Yet there he was, checking Peacekeeper, standing next to a vibrating Lena, and eyeing the laboratory around them with interest. The hanging tire swing was a surprise. The giant hole  blown in the wall let in a nice ocean breeze. Winston really should get that fixed.

Mei had tried to opt out, claiming cryostasis hadn’t given her any opportunity to keep up her skills. And her lucky timing with the glacier and the critters ‘didn’t count’. She assured them she would only bring the rest of them down, but Winston had pointed out that since he wasn’t participating, the teams would be unevenly split without her. She conceded to his point and stood next to Lena, who was vibrating because she was explaining to her hero exactly how her accelerator worked.

Winston sat in a tire that was on the floor in front of the main screen. A smart alternative to a desk chair, if McCree said so himself. There was a bunch of bananas hanging within easy reach. A to-do list that was mostly crossed off read that Winston still had to order more peanut butter. A quick peek in the trashcan revealed empty jars of the stuff. Angela caught Jesse looking. She looked torn between a smile and a professional frown.

“Winston, are you experiencing any problems with your genetic therapy?” She asked conversationally.

“Aside from a devastating addiction to peanut butter?” Winston deadpanned, knowing full well she was itching to go on another one of her health tirades.

“Happens to the best of us.” Jesse said, and poked Angela’s side. It didn’t do much, the plasticoid armor of her suit protected her from the very real danger of tickling.

Given the fact that Torbjörn had not yet arrived, they didn’t have the training bots turned on. None of them, Winston included, felt confident enough to try to get them working again after being defunct for so long. Not even the friendly ones. The ranges were working, but were only good for target practice and the stationary equipment. So Winston had given them the equivalent of blanks for each of their respective weapons, ridiculous vests to let Athena count hits, and Jesse couldn’t help but feel like a kid about to go for a rousing round of laser tag.

And they weren’t even going to be using the ranges. Combat laser tag. Outdoors edition.

Zenyatta, Lúcio, and Hanzo came up behind them, the latter putting in their brand new comms and checking the connections on their handhelds.

“This thing on? Can you hear me?” Lúcio said with his finger in his ear.

“Loud and clear.” McCree said.

“The communicator and I have become as one.” Zenyatta’s cool voice could be heard next.

“Welcome, _sense_ i.” Genji said.

“Testing.” Hanzo was last to check in.

“One, two, three.” said Mei-Ling, shooting him a thumbs up.

“Okay! That’s everyone set up!” It seemed the fruit and vitamins Mercy had forced onto Winston after breakfast had done their job, because the sleep-deprived gorilla was all enthusiastic business. “Zenyatta, Hanzo, Lúcio! You will stay here with me, observing our agents. Watch how they move, how they fight! Take your own style into account. You will be put into the group training sessions starting tomorrow. Use today to get a feel for what to expect.”

Lúcio nodded seriously. Zenyatta confirmed his understanding. Hanzo didn’t react at all.

“So how we gonna do this? Pick team captains and make like a school game of dodgeball? In tha’ case, I call captain ‘nd I call Mercy.” McCree said to the room at large. He was having trouble adjusting the black tactical vest underneath his _sarape._ The buckles kept catching on the wool, and this was his favorite one. It didn’t need any more tears.

“I’m flattered.” Angela said dryly, looking over her Caduceus staff carefully. She gleamed in her white Valkyrie suit, every inch the angel she was named after.

“We’ll do it by seniority.” Winston decided, liking the idea. “Agents Reinhardt and Mercy. Team captains. Teams of three. Reinhardt, your team will be attacking. Mercy, defense.”

“She only has me beat by a few months!” Jesse protested immediately. 

The team captains squared off. They shook hands. Reinhardt was attempting to look intimidatingly down at Angela. For his size and his formidable armor, McCree thought it couldn’t be that hard. But the man was trying and failing to hold back a smile, and Angela was grinning up at him unabashedly. They turned to face the assembled agents. Jesse made a not so discreet gesture towards himself and mouthed ‘ _pick me_ ’ at Angela. She raised an eyebrow.

“Ladies first!” Reinhardt allowed. Mercy considered, ignored McCree’s frantic waving, and smiled.

“Genji.” She said. McCree gasped and placed a hand on his chest, a little more than mock affronted. Genji slapped his back as he walked past.

“Tracer!” Reinhardt took his turn with no prompting. The next second, she had blinked into existence next to him.

Mei and McCree exchanged looks. Neither wanted to be stuck in the team without a support. Jesse felt a shot of panic when he realized there was no way he was going to win against Mei-Ling’s big brown eyes. That, and Angela needed someone on defense.

Angela was struggling to hold back a laugh. “Mei.” she managed. Mei-Ling squealed in joy and rushed to join her side of the group. “Sorry Jesse.” Angela said as she welcomed Mei with a gracious smile.

“That’s Agent McCree to you, ma’am. Jeez. You think you know a gal.” he didn’t even try not to sound hurt. He stomped over to Lena and Reinhardt, who were laughing in good nature.

“McCree! Join us! We will celebrate glorious victory against our adversaries!” Boomed the knight.

“Yeah, yeah pardner. With no support we’re gonna need a miracle, and the angel is leading the enemy.”

“Bah! Those are, how do you say,” he copied McCree’s southern twang, badly, “ _THEM’S QUITTIN’ WORDS!_ Chin up, boy! Trust in my shield!”

“I have closed comm connections between opposing teams.” Athena’s voice swept over them. “Video feed from loading bay is being linked to you, Winston. Teams, please take your positions.”

“Reinhardt, you heard her. The payload is by the loading bay. You’ll have ten minutes to talk strategy before I let Mercy’s team out of this room. Get going.” Winston pointed at the door with a banana.

“We will see you on the battlefield!” Reinhardt called to the others as he rushed Lena and Jesse out the doors.

“How come Winston don’t gotta show off with the rest of us?” He grumbled loudly just before the doors closed behind them. Lena laughed.

“Someone’s gotta man the scoreboards.”

“What are we, entertainment?”

“Got it in one.” Lena winked at him.

* * *

 

“Agent Tracer- ” Athena’s voice called through the intercom.

Tracer whipped back, away from the wall where four of Genji’s _shuriken_ had previously pinned her, and stood safely by the abandoned trail of the payload.

“Let’s try that again!” And she was off, gone in the blink of an eye. And in the blink of her chronal accelerator.

“....Safe.” Athena said, and the intercom shut off.

The worst was over. In the span of five hectic minutes, Reinhardt had managed to cover him as they defended and pushed the payload, getting it safely out of the open air of the loading docks and into the tunnel leading to the warehouse. Lena was running to and fro, the only match for Genji’s speed as he worked alone towards stopping them from reaching their goal. Mercy had appeared a few times to ‘heal’ him before Athena could announce him ‘out’.

Mei had thrown up an ice wall and effectively ruined McCree’s visual on her and Mercy. They were up to something, and Reinhardt’s shield could only cover one side of the payload at a time.

Lena was giggling. She shot her pistols at Genji, who ducked and rushed forward, waving his sword in a downward swipe. Lena blinked and was gone, only to reappear behind him with a taunt and a stuck out tongue.

But Genji’s pivot was fluid and smooth as he let the momentum his sword already carried twist backwards and Jesse knew it was too late to throw a flashbang.

Lena yelled, “Bollocks!” just as the blunt sword made contact with her middle.

“Agent Tracer- ” Began Athena, just as the rumble of Mei’s falling ice wall began.

Lena recalled to three seconds prior, and redirected her blink to a safe distance away from Genji’s sword’s range. This time, she blew a raspberry at him.

“...Safe.” Athena rectified.

McCree took advantage of Genji’s momentary confusion to peek out of the safety of Reinhardt’s shield to shoot him down. He raised Peacekeeper and Mercy stepped out of her hiding spot from the catwalk just above and shot at his arm with her blaster, just as she had been doing since the beginning of this dang training session.

“Ah, fuck.” he cursed, bringing his arm back to safety. She had just missed him. At her current range, she couldn’t do much damage. McCree heard the whoosh of her wings carrying her away out of sight. He had already been hit three times by one of her fake beams. The light was pretty. But they, along with a nick from one of Genji’s _shuriken_ had made Athena inform him that his health had dropped to 140.

Mei was nowhere to be seen, and McCree was getting antsy. He didn’t like having to stay with Reinhardt. But it was the easiest cover, and he had to protect them just in case Mei made her appearance.

Tracer got in a lucky shot, if Genji’s _"Kuso.”_ and Mercy’s “I’ve got you.” were anything to go on. [2]

Out of the corner of his eye, he registered movement. The swinging coil of Mei’s gun disappeared down a hallway he knew led to an opening they would be ambushed in if the payload kept moving at its current rate. If she didn’t hear him coming, he could take her out easy with a flashbang and a headshot before she made him a popsicle.

Mercy hit Genji with a damage boost. Tracer cursed, Reinhardt charged forward to help protect her, leaving McCree alone with the payload. He clambered on top to get a better view of everything. The damage boost would get Tracer. McCree could already hear the crackle on the intercom of Athena getting ready to call her out. He had to get Mercy first.

He feigned stepping up again to give Genji another shot. At the last second, he whirled around and shot up, following the tether of her boost, around where he knew Mercy would be. Judging by her high-pitched shout of alarm, he had faux-hit something. But Athena wasn’t announcing her as out. McCree had a brief window. He took it.

He ran out, abandoning the payload and barking at Lena and Reinhardt to get back and protect the payload.

“Copy that.” Tracer sounded out of breath, still dancing just out of reach of Genji’s blades.

With Genji occupied and Reinhardt about to head back to the payload, their biggest threat was a certain ice-wielding climatologist whose giggle would give away the second they were about to lose. McCree wasn’t gonna let that happen. He had his pride as an agent, and, well, a point to stick to Mercy.

“Do not go that way.” A new voice crackled to life on the comm. Smooth accent, imperious tone. The brother.

“What the fuck?!” He hissed, but he wasn’t stupid, and so he dove behind some crates for cover and stuck a finger to his ear. “The hell is he doing on the line? Winston!”

“I thought assigning the recruits to play advisor would be a good idea. You would have me and Athena on an actual mission.” Winston answered, somewhat distracted. “Call it improving authenticity. Now play nice.” Winston sounded like he was joking on the last bit, but Jesse heard the commanding undertone.

“If you want to take out Mei, she has you out maneuvered. Her drone will be on the lookout further in.” Hanzo went on smoothly, unperturbed by McCree’s blatant dislike.

“Welcome to the team, Mister Shimada!” Tracer was saluting cheekily at a camera on her end of the line, Jesse would bet money on it.

“WE. WILL. BE. VICTORIOUS!” Roared Reinhardt, followed by the sound of his rocket hammer and the pings of Mercy’s blaster.

“Aw, how’d we get landed with him!?” McCree groused as he heard the fighting move towards him. He aimed over the top of the crates at what he could get at of Mercy’s middle, careful not to hit Reinhardt by mistake. Not that his armor wouldn’t protect him from whatever virtual damage Athena would assign a hit of friendly fire. Bullseye. Angela looked down at her stomach at the mark his red blank had left, a match to the stain on her left leg. He ducked back before she could see him. He heard the sound of Mercy activating her staff after holstering her blaster. Athena still didn’t mark her as out.

“I decided to be the neutral party.” sing-sang Lúcio, joining in.

“He is aiding me in another matter.” said Athena.

“Do as I say.” repeated Hanzo, in a tone of voice that brooked no argument. Well damn. He was a bossy sonuvabitch. Who’d have guessed? He ran to the hallway behind him, pausing just in the doorway to check for Snowball. Clear. He stood hidden at the edge of the doorway. From there, he could see Mei waiting at the platform above where the payload was getting ready to pass by.

McCree brooked an argument anyway. “And how do we know ya ain’t aimin’ on aiding and abettin’ your brother?” he asked, eyes on the fight and ears peeled for the buzz of Mei’s drone.

“Because the omnic is helping them, and if you know my brother half as well as he implies you do, you will know that he hates to lose. And he has only ever lost to me. Now, do as I say.”

 _Play nice,_ warned Winston. _Give him a chance,_ chided Genji.

“Fuckin’ hell. Fine. Where do I go?”

“Tracer. Genji is making a move for the payload. Intercept him.” Hanzo ordered.

“Roger.” Tracer said, her voice dragging at the end while she blinked into position. McCree saw from his hiding spot as Genji came into view, followed by the blue stream of light that was Tracer coming out of a blink. Genji stood at the top of the payload and swept the wide room with his gaze, no doubt looking for him. But Tracer was engaging, and McCree couldn’t get a headshot in without blowing his cover and letting Mei know where he was or hitting Tracer.

“Mei plans to put up another ice wall once the payload reaches her. From her vantage point, she can freeze anyone that goes to move it along, making it easy pickings for Genji. She has a view of the entire warehouse.”

Bastard was ignoring his question. The ice wall went up, just as he said. Blue jets of light, no doubt supposed to be ice, peppered the ground around Tracer and Genji. Mei was following old fashioned Overwatch tactics. If the payload you’re attacking ain’t slowing down, take the damn thing down. Smuggled weapons are better destroyed than in the hands of the enemy.

“Reinhardt. Mercy’s blasts will not harm you enough for Athena to call you out. Disengage and move back to the payload. Equip your shield, level it down. Mei will see you coming and attempt to freeze you from above. Do you know the range of her gun?” Hanzo’s voice was all business. Giving out commands like he knew how they ticked. Worst thing was, it seemed like he did.

_"Ja!”_ [3]

Mercy flew in, the crackling light of her Caduceus staff connecting with Mei. And there was that giggle he was so dreading on hearing.

“Then tilt your barrier up once in range.” Hanzo was still talking to Reinhardt in his ear. “McCree. Disregard Mercy.” He had caught him looking. She had flown to perch next to Mei, who was trying to wear down Reinhardt’s barrier. “Tracer is not capable of doing Genji enough damage to get him out before Mercy heals him.”

“Sad, but true. Save strappin’ a bomb on him, but I don’t like using them ‘less I need to.” Tracer grunted. Hanzo kept talking. This was the most Jesse had ever heard out of him.

“You have to goad him. He will be brash, and attempt to face you head on. Stun him. He has the advantage if he gets close enough, but with good timing, you can win. This is, of course, assuming you have halfway decent aim.” He could swear the son of a bitch was trying to goad him just like he was telling him to goad Genji.

“Halfway decent?!” McCree sputtered. Tracer gave a twinkling laugh. Reinhardt chortled and mimicked McCree’s accent again, this time booming, “ _Them’s FIGHTIN’ words!_ ”

Tracer chose that moment to get hit by one of Mei’s now amplified blue jets of light. She wasn’t frozen in ice, but she was still suspended. She couldn’t recall when Genji stepped up to her calmly, and lightly tapped her on the neck with one of his swords.

“Agent Tracer, out.” Did Athena sound slightly glad to be able to finally call it? Tracer unfroze and sighed dramatically as she blinked away, no doubt to go join Winston in the lab.

“I wonder if I left anything in my locker here!” she called out one last time on the team comm, voice crackling through her jump.

Before Genji could turn his attention on Reinhardt, who was this close to losing his barrier to Mei’s hits, McCree stepped out and called out, “Now that ain’t no way to be treatin’ a lady.”

Genji turned towards the sound of his voice and raised his sword. “What’s faster?” He said, robotic voice carrying with only the slightest waver above the noise of the fight around them. “Your arm, or my legs?”

“I’d put money on your legs if this was a bet, but for the sake of the here ‘n’ now, I’m sayin’ my arm.” McCree raised Peacekeeper and motioned with it, issuing his challenge.

Genji rushed at him, yelling and feigning left and right the whole time. Watching carefully, McCree took a flashbang and flung it where he knew Genji would whip next, and emptied Peacekeeper’s barrel for good measure in what he presumed was his stunned face after landing the headshot.

Well. That was easy.

“Agent Genji, out.” Athena called over the intercom. Genji gave a good-natured laugh and wiped the red paint from his visor.

“One day, McCree.” He wagged a finger at him. McCree grinned and tipped his hat at him as the ninja rushed off in the direction Lena had disappeared before. He thumbed ammo into his gun as he watched Reinhardt. The flickering on that barrier told him that the old man was about to need some help.

“Do not go to him.” Hanzo barked in his ear. Ah, there he was.

“Why the hell not? He’s about to lose the shield!”

Right on cue, Reinhardt shouted out, “Barrier is falling!”

“Mercy and Mei are both concentrated on him. If you keep your absurd spurs silent, you will be able to sneak up and take them out using the passage on the other side of-”

“Yeah, yeah, pardner.” McCree muttered, and completely disregarded what Hanzo was saying. Reinhardt’s shield fell, and he ducked behind the payload to escape the rain of both Mei’s and Mercy’s blasters. McCree ran forward and did a combat role to evade another shot from Mercy. Safe behind the bulk of the payload, he skittered over Reinhardt’s hammer to aim a shot at Mei.

All he heard from Hanzo was a noise of disapproval, and the comm went silent.

“Glad you could join the fight!” Reinhardt said. McCree knew he was smiling under the helmet. He always was.

“You looked like you could use a lil’ help here, big guy.”

They ducked at the sound of another ice wall being raised. Mercy disappeared behind it. Mei was running along the top of it, sending down icicles that disappeared the second they hit something solid. Reinhardt was fine in his armor. McCree’s chest plate protected him from one, but his shoulder took a shot of fleeting cold.

“Health dropped to 75.” Athena recited in his ear. Damn. That must have been a charged shot.

“If I take Mercy out, can you deal with Mei with a fire strike?” He asked, hiding behind the bigger man’s bulk without a hint of shame.

“ _Ja._ I’ll prime and take aim when her wall begins to fall. Mercy will no doubt be on guard. Be ready!”

“I got somethin’ else planned there, pardner.” McCree winked and ran out at the first rumble of Mei’s falling wall. He rounded the edge of it, dodging a huge chunk of ice that was very much real, and spotted Mercy floating down, staff raised, about to unleash another damage tether.

“No hard feelings, Angie!” he yelled to be heard over the crack of his shot, and he knew she would kill him later for the paint in her golden hair.

“Agent Mercy, out.” Athena said.

“ _Verdammt_. Jesse!” she snapped, hands coming up to swipe away her wet bangs. He blew her a kiss, he turned back to check on Reinhardt, and many things happened at once.  [4]

He felt something cold connect to the back of his head and teetered to the left as his legs became unable to move mid-turn. He fell like a stiff statue to his side and his stomach made contact with a very pointy tip of another very real chunk of fallen ice. He watched Mei take aim and the glimmer of a fake icicle hit him straight between the eyes. He heard the _whoosh_ of Reinhardt’s projectile attack, and watched Mei tumble off what was left of her wall.

“Agent McCree, out. Agent Mei, out.”

From there, Reinhardt made quick work of escorting the payload to its designated point. Mercy flew over to check on Mei. McCree was unfrozen by whatever newfangled technology had kept him suspended without actual ice, and Reinhardt roared their triumph.

“Agent Reinhardt’s team has successfully secured the payload. Agent Mercy’s team failed their operation. That concludes the team training session for the day. Please join Winston and the other agents back in the lab at your earliest disposal to go over data from the battle.” There was an edge to Athena’s voice as it echoed slightly in the quiet of the warehouse.

It was almost enough to make Jesse figure he should be worried, but his stomach hurt too much. Angela powered up her staff one last time, and one feeling of a cold bucket of water dumped over his head later, he was just fine. In the locker room, he shrugged off his _sarape,_ then the vest, and last his chest plate. He went over to Reinhardt to help him out of his armor. He was thanked profusely and loudly for his troubles, and received a grateful slap to the back.

“You guys almost done?” Mei called from outside the door of the men’s locker room.

“Yeah, pretty much.” McCree called back, wrapping his sarape back around his shoulders. The AC was always running too hard in this Watchpoint, but he was the only one that ever complained. The rest said it was better than Spanish heat outside. Coming from New Mexico, Jesse knew better than to call that heat.

“Then we’ll wait for you to go back to the lab, then.” There was a hint of worry in her tone of voice.

Once they made it back into the main building, McCree could understand why. A familiar male voice was yelling angrily, coming from the open door of Winston’s lab. At their angle, they couldn’t see much of anything. Reinhardt began to run towards it, in equal parts joy and wanting to de-escalate the argument they were all hearing very clearly.

“- if I had known giving you the chance to be in charge would result in recruiting fucking omnics!”

A few steps more and the room inside the door came into view. Lúcio stood behind Winston, arms raised as if ready to intervene. Hanzo and Genji were standing in front of Zenyatta, the former in detached disdain and the latter bristling.

“Torby, please!” Lena was kneeling, one arm outstretched to ward Winston back, and the other wrapped around their newest stray as if she had just been in the middle of a hug. In front of her stood a very short, very angry little man with a very impressive beard. McCree tugged at his own wishfully. Genji’s previous words echoed in his head. _One day, McCree._

“Torbjörn! My friend! You did not tell us you were coming!” Reinhardt cut through the tension in the room and surged forward to lift both Lena and Torbjörn in a crushing hug.

“Let go of me old man, before you blow your back!” Torbjörn yelled while banging what he could reach of Reinhardt’s back. Lena giggled helplessly, held aloft and legs swinging wildly as Reinhardt rocked in place.

“Me!? An old man!? HA HA! Well then, what does that make you?”

“A younger one.” Torbjörn griped and smacked the side of Reinhardt’s head none too lightly. He was dropped promptly. Lena was placed back onto the floor gently, for which she was grateful.

Torbjörn turned around to look at the rest of them, who had managed to pack in the entryway of the lab, a bit reluctant to come any nearer should Torbjörn start swinging around that hammer strapped to his belt.

“Well? Do I get a welcome back, or what?” He almost sounded contrite.

Angela was the first to unfreeze. “You didn’t say you were coming!” She said and bounded towards him in what could only be described as a skip. “You just missed a practice session!” She kneeled down to peck him lightly on the cheek and straightened up to grin down at him happily.

Torbjörn rubbed the spot where her lips had just been and flashed her a smile. “All the better. I saved you kids the shame of getting beat down!”

“Ha! Mighty big talk, for someone so far past over the hill that they’re reaching the base again.” McCree tipped his hat, as was his custom, and grinned to match Angela.

“Still making no sense, are you?” Torbjörn shot back. Jesse grunted. Mei stepped up from behind him with a sympathetic rub to his back.

“Hello!” She chirped, offering a freshly de-mitted hand to Torbjörn, who took it with his own freshly de-gloved hand. “I’ve heard so much about you! I’m Mei-Ling Zhou, nice to meet you!” Mei stared at his claw, clamped tight over the black glove, in fascination. “You’ve got to show me how that works!”

“You’re an engineer?” Torbjörn answered, letting go of her hand and sliding his glove back on.

Mei-Ling shook her head. “I dabble.” She said, and nodded at Snowball behind her. “I have to fix up _xuě qiú_ sometimes.”

Torbjörn looked at Snowball with interest written all over his face. “I’ll show you how this works,” he nodded at his arm, “If you show me how that works.”

Mei grinned. “It’s a deal.”

Reinhardt was back to trying to give people hugs, and Torbjörn was busy evading the swing of his arms. For all his grumbling, the old fart did look happy to be back, even if he was shooting the omnic backed into the corner by his overprotective student suspicious glares.

“Torbjörn, the decision was not mine alone.” Winston tried again, forcibly keeping his tone level. 

“So I should be mad at everyone?” Torbjörn turned to look at him so fast Jesse is surprised he didn’t fall over.

“Torby.” Lena whined. Angela looked close to joining her. Genji hadn’t said a word the entire time. He had his real sword strapped to his back now, and a hand hovering over his _wakizashi_. He would let it do the talking if Torbjörn turned any of his prejudiced words into actions. McCree subtly made his way over to stand next to him, just in case.

“Speaking of training sessions,” Angela butted in, as if they were naturally still on that subject, “Winston has started up group training sessions, but we didn’t want to risk turning on the training bots without you, Torbjörn.”

“It’d be mighty nice to have somethin’ to actually shoot actual rounds at, Torby.” McCree nodded, quick to back Angela up in her quest for peace.

“Ah, fuck. Those old things? I can have them ready and improved by the sim tomorrow. I’ll need a few hands. That means you, Jesse, Lena. And Winston too, if you have the time.”

“Course.” Jesse replied. Lena shot a thumbs up.

“When do you need me?” said Winston.

“Wait for me to get settled in, will you? No need to sound so eager.” Torbjörn snapped. Reinhardt patted the top of his head fondly and earned himself a punch to the leg for his affections. “I’ll call for you on the comms. We still have those, right?” he went on. Winston searched the top of his desk and offered him one promptly. Torbjörn grunted his thanks, put it in his ear immediately and sent out a test call.

Reinhardt tried to rope him into a tour of the base, which Torbjörn refused with a, “I’ve been stationed here before, you numpty. Together, in fact. I swear that helmet of yours is crushing your brain to the size of a pebble, Wilhelm.” 

Reinhardt ignored him, and there wasn’t much the drastically shorter man could do to try to stop him other than protest very loudly as he was steered pointedly away from Zenyatta and out the door. The girls followed them out. Genji only relaxed a fraction. McCree shot him a sympathetic look. Things were going to be tense around here if Torbjörn couldn’t get over his hate of omnics. Not that the fellow’s fears weren’t understandable, he was just being unreasonable. He was being an old man, and McCree gave him the benefit that they would all become that one day.

"Well. That happened." Lúcio shook his head and sat back down on the edge of Winston's tire, typing away and talking to Athena. Winston himself went to his work table and started fussing over one of the security drones. The four in the corner didn't move.

“Rest your fears, Genji. Reach for the calm at your center, the storm has passed.” Zenyatta placed a calming hand on Genji's back.

The storm had a room reserved for him a hall down from where the new recruits were staying. Five doors down from Zenyatta, if McCree remembered correctly.

“Yes, sensei.” Genji straightened out of his fighting stance, but tension was still set in his shoulders. Hanzo cast him and Zenyatta an assessing look, but did no more than that. Then his gaze moved onto Jesse and his ever-present frown changed to a grimace.

At odds with what Zenyatta had just advised Genji, McCree felt himself tense. “What?”

Hanzo’s only answer was to narrow his eyes at him.

“The hell did I do to you now?” Annoyance ringing in his voice.

“You nearly cost your teammates the match.” Hanzo tilted his head back, looking down at him without the advantage of several inches’ worth of height. Genji sighed in his spot between them. Zenyatta’s lights were blinking in a slow pattern.

“The risk was worth it, wasn’t it? I got Mercy out.”

“And opened yourself up to attack. Had that been an actual battle, you would have died and left Agent Reinhardt without support, seeing as he cannot wield his weapon whilst equipping his barrier-”

“He was fine! He won us the match, remember? I gave him the opening! I hit ‘em, and got Genji out didn’t I? Nevermind Mei and her darn blaster- how’s a guy supposed to defend against- ”

“By simply doing as I said!” Hanzo cut him off, and McCree was reminded of his dislike of being interrupted. Not that he had any qualms to do it himself. “You were a fool to rush out as you did! If you had kept back and stayed under cover, you wouldn’t have gotten hit and would have been able to do more damage.”

He snorted and began to walk away. “Yeah, sweetie. Talk it up. Call me a fool. Ain’t like you coulda done better, in the heat of it.”

McCree didn’t hear an answer and smugly thought he had won, but he heard Torbjorn still yelling at Reinhardt in the distance and an odd saying of his came to his mind. Something about pigs and bags. He looked over his shoulder to see what had kept Hanzo from throwing some scathing retort at him and stopped short. There was a look on his face. The same look he had seen flash past right before Hanzo had done the unexpected and asked about his bet the night before.

Curiosity. 

Question was, what was he going to do about it?

“Genji.” Hanzo didn’t even have the courtesy of answering Jesse. He turned to his brother.

“Hm?” Genji was still on alert, eyeing the doorway Torbjörn and Reinhardt had gone through a minute ago. Hanzo put a curled hand to his mouth as he thought. Finally, he looked up to Genji, who felt his gaze and tore his eyes from the door.

“I change my mind.” Hanzo tilted his head towards McCree. McCree looked at them both, confused.

Genji snapped to attention and turned to fully face his brother, exclaiming gleefully, _"Hontō ni!?"_ [5]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The fact that the game’s only option is for them to fight each other is forever weird to me. I mean, i guess, i get it, mass multi player fps and all but why no actual in-verse enemies ya can’t just make a team of widows and reapers and be done with it
> 
> [1] Hispanic soap operas. The best soap operas.  
> [2]shit (it’s not really much of a curse in Japan tho I’ve got third graders using it when they drop their pencil case)  
> [3]Yes  
> [4]damn/ed  
> [5]Really?


	6. Seeing is Believing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realize this is kinda late but we had a big observation at one of my schools, there were like, sixty English teachers and I had to prepare to make a speech. I hate speeches.  
> Thank you [WhiteNoize33666](http://archiveofourown.org/users/WhiteNoize33666/pseuds/WhiteNoize33666) for brainstorming with me.  
>   
> See end notes for English translations, if on pc you can hover over the japanese for the kanji.

McCree didn’t understand many things about his own life. He didn’t understand how a fella like him stayed alive as long as he had. He didn’t understand how he didn’t have lung cancer yet. He still wasn’t all that sure how he ended up in an organization built for heroes. And he certainly didn’t understand what he could have done to deserve standing in Range One while two grown Japanese men were doing what could only be described as snickering behind his back. In front of him.

Well, he couldn’t think of what he could have done to deserve it _recently._  

He turned to Zenyatta. “Any chance you understand Japanese?”

 _"Hai."_ The omnic said by way of an answer. [1]

“Any chance you can translate?” he added hopefully.

The grid of lights on Zenyatta’s faceplate blinked sporadically. McCree figured it was contemplatively.

 _"Īe."_ The omnic said by way of an answer. This time with a trace of mirth. And damn it if that didn’t make Jesse more curious. [2]

“Y’all done over there?” He called over to the pair of ninjas, who were bent over the control panel for the range. This wasn’t the first time Genji suggested target practice. But this was the first time they would be joined by Hanzo and Zenyatta. And Zenyatta was only here to appease his student, who had seemed more than a little reluctant to go anywhere without him while Torbjörn was still fuming.

“The process of setting up the practice range is not a simple one, McCree.” Genji said, pushing a few more buttons on the wide pad.  McCree snorted. He had half a mind of bringing Athena into this, but decided to let Genji have his moment. He walked over to them, arms crossed, footsteps loud, and spurs jangling all the way. Zenyatta floated after him in his quiet manner.

Genji motioned for him to step up to the firing point. McCree complied, unholstering Peacekeeper and running his usual checks. Genji then passed Zenyatta a pair of earmuffs, which he then tried to give to McCree, who waved a hand and refused them. Hanzo took them instead. The brother brought the muffs over and behind his head, letting them hang around his neck. He stood in the stand next to his and began looking over his bow.

As far as bows went, (and McCree hadn’t spent much time around archers. It was a defunct, showy, ceremonial, and laggy specialty of sniper. How much damage could a pointy wooden dowel do in a war where guns existed?) Hanzo’s looked pretty hi-tech. No buttons and flashing lights or anything, but it was a sight prettier than the things he’d seen used in competitions on television. And it had a handle.

Zenyatta and Genji took their places in the two spots next to Hanzo. Hanzo brought the muffs up over his ears.

“Athena, if you would.” Zenyatta prompted politely. Athena’s answer was to pull up three targets on each of their lines, all at varying heights and distances. She turned the ventilators on, and that was their cue to start.

McCree was the quickest, three bullseyes in three quick shots. Genji was just as quick, but nowhere near as accurate. None of his shuriken made it to the red dot at the center of the head, but two of them landed reasonably close. Zenyatta, the slowest, sent a volley of his destruction orbs and was at about the same level as Genji was in terms of aim, not that it mattered with explosives.

Hanzo, who finished off his targets third, matched McCree in aim. It was nothing McCree didn’t expect. Stationary targets and arrows. Picturesque and wholly unsurprising.

Four more rounds of that, and Jesse was starting to figure that yeah, the guy could keep up, but nocking arrows and reaching back for new ones wouldn’t go that well in close quarters. Target practice was good and all, but no one was making to kill them at the present moment.

Then Athena brought moving targets into the mix, the humanoid figures moving and bobbing behind new cover brought up to mimic buildings. When the smoke from Zenyatta’s orbs cleared, shurikens could be seen littering the ground and the edges of the targets, a few on the main bodies. Blasts blown into the corners of buildings, and a few of the dummies knocked back off their stands. And for every target, there was a bullet hole and an arrow shaft sticking out of where a real enemies’ head would be. Every single one.

Jesse felt his pulse quicken. His pupils dilated further, an itch began under his skin. He turned to look at a now earmuff-less Hanzo, who was taking in the shurikens sticking out of the ground with a frown. He wasn’t even checking to see if his arrows had met their marks. He already knew, didn’t he? He knew he was good. He watched as Hanzo’s clear brown eyes sought out his brother. They settled on him, and the expression on his face briefly flashed to something an awful lot like nausea before settling back into its resting frown.

“Well! It seems we are outmatched, master.” Genji exclaimed in mock-surprise. The compartment in his arm for his shuriken was open, and a single throwing star was jamming the little panel. He was meddling with some wiring inside, completely unconcerned. “But my arm is acting up. I will have to join you again some other time.” He walked to the sparring mats and sat down cross-legged, still fiddling with his arm.

Zenyatta nodded and followed, thanking Jesse and Hanzo pleasantly for a rewarding practice session. With two of them leaving, Hanzo started to leave as well.

Hanzo was watching his brother with very well concealed pain in his eyes. Jesse wondered at the why, but his momentary amazement at his aim faded away and he remembered exactly why looking at Genji pick at his hollow mechanical arm would upset Hanzo.

That is, if he believed the whole “atone and reconciliation” angle he was working. Which he didn’t.

Knowing that still didn’t get the itch out from the tips of his fingers, though. Hanzo shouldered his weapon, made to leave, and McCree wanted nothing more in that moment than to stop him. It felt important. It felt like something that had to happen, and Jesse was merely a tool of fate as he blurted out the first thing he thought of that would make him stay. He shuffled after him before he could get too far.

“Alright, Shimada-san. That’s enough playin’ around. Time to address the issue at hand. I didn’t endure your dang naggin’ during the practice session to have you up and quit just when things are getting interestin’.”

All he got was a raised eyebrow and a nod towards the shooting field that Athena was already having cleaned for another round. “Surely you can see that we are well matched.” Hanzo said with a grimace, as if admitting to it was worse than swallowing bile.

“That there’s fine target work, but it ain’t anythin’ like the real deal. I betcha I’m still a better shot. Let’s up the ante.” If Jesse didn’t stop the grin tugging at his lips, he blamed the rush of adrenaline when Hanzo pulled his bow back off his shoulder and tugged at the string experimentally.

 _"Boku wa omae- iie, anata to onaji kurai jōzu ni utsu._ What more would you have us do?”  [3]

“What was that first part?” It hadn’t sounded like an insult, so Jesse didn’t waste time sounding offended.

“Money where your mouth is, cowboy!” Genji called out from where he and Zenyatta had begun going through a series of stretches on the training mats. Jesse hadn’t even realized they were still in the range. He only had eyes for the surly archer who was trying his darndest not to look interested in going a few more rounds.

“What’s the bet?” He called back.

Genji quietly muttered something to Zenyatta, who answered similarly. Genji raised his arm to point at him. “I wager four cooking rotations that Hanzo can shoot down ten targets quicker than you can.”

“With a bow and arrow? Pfft, you’re on.”

“Do not hasten to be rash, McCree.” Zenyatta said. Hanzo was looking back at his brother with his lips pursed, obviously displeased. He had to know his bow wasn’t a match for a six-shooter in terms of speed. But he did not say anything in protest.

“Nevermind the bow, but if Genji’s sayin’ that someone’s a quicker draw than me, I’ll believe it when I see it.” McCree answered Zenyatta, who took his answer silently. Genji made some noise that McCree couldn’t assign actual English to, but that made Hanzo smirk.

“Athena, ten targets, randomly dispersed, if you please.” Hanzo requested politely. The resulting flurry of movement on the range was answer enough from the overworked AI. The bastard was nicer to an AI than to human beings.

Hanzo motioned with his gloved hand, the universal _you first_ gesture. McCree stepped back up to the firing stand, loaded Peacekeeper, and leveled it at the new targets Athena had set up. “Mind timing me there, Miss Athena?”

“Of course, Agent McCree.” The previously dark scoreboard lit up, timer set at zero. “Three, two, one, begin!” She called, and after a cursory glance at the course, McCree lined up his first six shots before the screen could reach ten.

A few seconds were spent on reloading, and Jesse allowed himself a moment to glance over at Hanzo. He looked begrudgingly impressed, a look which he schooled into nonchalance when he caught Jesse looking.

The last four shots were a piece of cake. Athena called his time overhead and McCree turned on his heel to face Hanzo, twirling his gun and putting it back in his holster in one fluid motion.  

“And that’s not even using Deadeye.” he drawled, but was ignored by Hanzo, who stepped up in his place.

Behind them, Genji stood up to watch. Zenyatta stayed as he was, but he did turn his head by a small fraction.

Hanzo stood lateral to his targets, the muscles of his tattooed arm like a work of art as the limb moved back to pull the string of his bow. And the tattoo itself, well, those dragons clenched and twisted, riding the strength of the muscle underneath to look wondrously _alive._ McCree was a bit too hypnotized by their movement for a second to register anything else. Athena began her countdown, and Hanzo had the string fully drawn, with one arrow nocked and another between his fingers, ready to be drawn into place once the first was loosed. Posture relaxed, breathing deep, even, and regular, completely in his element.

Athena called start and the first arrow embedded itself into the red center of the leftmost target. Hanzo held for a few seconds, eyes darting around the configuration of the targets. The second arrow hit the center of a target suspended in the air to the center right atop a makeshift balcony. He reached behind to pull another two arrows from his quiver, another second of contemplation, another bullseye. The fourth arrow landed neatly in the target closest to the firing point. This time when Hanzo reached for his quiver, only one arrow was carried between his fingers.

This arrow, he made a show of aiming at different spots that weren’t even any of the targets. Finally he settled on a portion of the floor and held there. His eyes flickered over to McCree. His mouth held a hint of that smirk.

He was stalling. The timer was ticking. Five arrows in, and Jesse McCree was about to win.

Hanzo flicked the shaft of the arrow against the head of his bow, and before McCree could get a good look, it was gone. The shooting range exploded with ricocheting beams of modified arrows bouncing on the walls. Athena called McCree’s time, and a second later the last of Hanzo’s arrows had come to a stop in the center of the remaining six targets. Athena announced Agent McCree as the winner by a single second.

By a hair’s breadth. Jesse’s jaw had dropped so low it may as well have been grazing the tips of his boots.

Then, with his face the very image of graceful defeat, Hanzo stepped off the designation of his firing stand and gave Jesse a deep bow. Upon rising, he offered up his hand. Jesse took the handshake, reeling in what felt like shock and a weighty sense of whiplash.

“It appears you were correct, Agent McCree. Please accept my sincerest apologies for my actions towards you after the training session. I had no right to criticize you if I cannot match you.”

Match? He lost. McCree lost, and he was the only one who knew it. Hanzo had let him win. _The hell?_ Suspicion raised his hackles, he was about to open his mouth to ask exactly what angle he was working when Genji interrupted his train of thought.

“ _Onī-chan!”_ Genji whined from his spot on the mat, “If I am to cook more because you have neglected to keep up on your skills, you are going to help me!” The lights on Zenyatta’s forehead were flickering with what Jesse was beginning to learn was amusement. Hanzo gave him a dismissive wave and looked up at McCree.

 _"Hyaku bun wa ikken ni shikazu."_ said Hanzo. [4] Too far for Genji to hear, too low for it to be directed at anyone but Jesse. Hanzo didn’t care in the least that the person he was speaking to didn’t understand a word. The phrase dripped with smug satisfaction, and this wasn’t the first time a Shimada made Jesse wish he spoke Japanese. McCree, for his part, was still stunned speechless.

“Have you not been practicing? What was that?” Genji asked, disbelieving and sore for having lost. He rushed over to join them next to the shooting range.

“It seems placing foolish bets is not a habit you have outgrown.” Hanzo’s words were reprimanding, as if spoken to an unruly child.

Genji bristled. “It was not a foolish bet! I thought you would outshoot him, I thought you were capable of it!”

“So you were tryna swindle me, is what you’re sayin’.” interrupted Jesse. He was ignored.

“Foolish then, to place bets on anyone’s skill that is not your own.” His tone of voice only served to rile Genji more.

“It may as well have been, we took the same lessons! What’s the matter, Hanzo? That was beneath you! You would not have liked Kawashima-sensei’s punishment if he were alive to see you shoot so poorly!”

“Perhaps if you had taken the time to pay attention and give our teachers their due respect during our archery lessons, you could have taken this challenge in my place. Perhaps then we would have been equals.” Hanzo replied coolly. Genji visibly flinched. That had hit a nerve. Jesse felt the atmosphere turn leaden and watched the exchange go downhill with wide eyes, wondering what exactly had triggered it. He didn’t like Hanzo, but a few minutes ago the brothers had seemed thick as thieves. Jesse had honestly momentarily forgotten the bad blood between the two, and it hadn’t been because Hanzo was distracting.

“Ha!” Genji invaded his brother’s space, jamming a metal finger against his bare chest. “Kawashima always liked you best, and it wasn’t because you showed more talent! Not back then. I didn’t take his shit when he threatened us with father! But you? You’ve always been a….a.. Argh!” All those years, and the language barrier still liked to pop up. _"Gomasuri da!”_ [5]

Jesse had the sense that somewhere in this mess the subject had changed from the bet to something a lot more personal. He could only stand there awkwardly and spectate.

Hanzo shoved Genji’s hand away, but otherwise stood his ground. McCree saw Hanzo’s mood change, even if the archer’s face betrayed nothing. What had just seconds before been the well-intentioned chiding of an older brother became colder, harsher. He held himself straighter than before, somehow. Shoulders back, chest puffed out, long neck craned as it aided its owner in looking up at the younger Shimada as if he were some unpleasant inconvenience. A nuisance, something to be dealt with by harsh discipline. It was altogether not very fraternal.

Then, to match, Genji shifted as well. His usual poise and gracefulness turned into a slouch, a careless posture that told Hanzo that he wasn’t intimidating, wasn’t enough to make Genji comply with an unspoken threat. Zenyatta abandoned his spot at the mats and cautiously moved forward. It was that, more than anything, that alerted McCree to take a step forward, ready to intervene if things got uglier. He sidled next to Genji, almost tripping on the shells still littering the floor in his rush.

McCree had never known Genji during the time he had been completely human, but he wasn’t having a hard time imagining him now. Imprudent, bent on going against what everyone told him, a wild card, bowing to no one.

A lot like McCree in his younger days before Blackwatch bore like a shadow over him, if he was being honest.

“Watch your tongue.” The venom in Hanzo’s voice brought McCree back to the present. He leaned slightly, ready to cover the younger brother.

Genji laughed, the sound wrong and ugly to Jesse’s ears. “Ah, back to this, are we _nii-sama?”_ [6]

“Genji.” Zenyatta murmured softly from behind his student. Hanzo was steely faced. Genji barreled on.

“Can we not leave what is the past in the past?”

“You were the one to bring up Kawashima-sensei.” Pointing fingers, now. Real grown up.

“ _You were the one to bring up Kawashima-sensei!”_ Genji dropped his voice to mimic the gruff voice of his brother. “Can you hear yourself?!”

“I’m sure I could, if you would be silent and cease to behave like an insolent child!” As soon as the words left his mouth, regret flashed in Hanzo’s eyes. Genji was too offended to notice.

“Do not speak to me as if I were a child, Hanzo! You are not our father, no matter how much you try to be! How close you get to it at times! You are a good man! He-”

The moment of regret was gone. “You dare speak ill of the dead? Of our own father?”

“If I could not speak ill of him, then I would have nothing at all to say.” Genji ground out, voice on a whole new level of the word ‘bitter’.

“You ungrateful child! I see the years since he died have not been enough to teach you to respect your elders.” Hanzo bit out angrily.

“Oh, a lot about me has changed, brother. You made sure of that.”

If Genji’s previous flinch had seemed painful, it was nothing compared to how Hanzo staggered back, as if physically hit by Genji’s words.

Reluctant to step into this mess as he was, Jesse knew Genji had been excited by the prospect of mending things with his brother. Anger was a cruel mistress, it burned down bridges a much more level head worked hard towards building.

“Alright, that’s enough. Back off, the both of you.” He figured Genji would probably be the more responsive (and the least likely to stick him with an arrow) out of the both of them, so he nudged at a metal chest instead of a half-bare one. Genji let himself be pushed back, something Jesse was thankful for. The man was more than half metal, after all.

Hanzo gathered himself well enough to speak. “Were they empty words, then? Your assurances that I was forgiven.”

“Do not make this into something it’s not, brother. That still stands.” Genji sounded pained, behind the anger. Jesse knew it had been too good to be true. Wounds that ran as deep as his only stopped hurting if you convinced yourself there was no pain.

“Genji. Draw back, my student. To display one’s emotions honestly is good, but be careful not to fall into what constitutes as cruelty.” The disappointment in Zenyatta’s voice was enough to make McCree feel chastened, and he hadn’t even done anything. All the fight went out of Genji, along with a whistle of air from his exhaust vents. He turned on his heel and stormed out of the practice range, followed by Zenyatta, who calmly told him that he should visit the medbay to get his arm looked at. Jesse watched them go from his spot in front of Hanzo, still trying to process what he had just seen. The continuation of an age old argument that had started on the grounds of a different lifetime. Falling into old habits, snapping at each other like the dragons they were. Both too wounded to realize the damage they inflicted.

Atonement and reconciliation, indeed.

They were alone in the wide room. After a minute or so of standing in uncomfortable silence, Hanzo politely asked Athena if she would reset for archery practice, and quietly watched as she did as bid. Jesse moved back to the far wall, undoing the clasps that held his chest plate in place.

Jesse was well aware that he had a friend he should be going after to check on, but the entire situation didn’t sit right with him. What he had just seen was the Genji of almost a decade ago. Angry and brash, quick to lash out with the most hurtful thing to come to mind without caring for the carnage left in its wake. He had done it to Angela enough times for Jesse to have to step in, comfort one and scold the other.

It was the Genji before him, before friendship, before Zenyatta. It was a Genji he would honestly prefer not to have seen again. And his murderer of a brother was what brought it out of him.

Jesse braced for the cold wash of hate to come over him, but it was lighter this time around. Less genuine feeling and more a sense of duty. He felt he had to hate the guy, and he still did, but he had no place in the middle of their family squabbles.

So after he finished taking off his armor, he sat on one of the benches at the back of the practice range and just watched Hanzo. He watched Hanzo make what was probably one of the worst shots of his life. The arrow barely nicked the outer ring of the target. Jesse trained his eyes on the archer himself.

He was shaking.

Now Jesse McCree was a lot of things, but he wasn’t much one for letting suffering go unnoticed and unattended to, no matter his own personal biases. “You alright there, pardner?”

Then, by what must have been sheer force of willpower, the shaking stopped.

“Why are you still here?” Hanzo asked without looking back, a hint of anger still coloring his voice.

“Why are _you_ still here?” McCree shot back easily. “Now I ain’t got no siblings, but even a fella like me knows leaving a spat like that the way you two did is gonna lead to some pretty tense awkward silences later on.”

“If you have no siblings, then you cannot understand what it is like.” Hanzo resumed shooting, more steadily, ending the conversation.

“I think it’s not so complicated a thing that I can’t get the general gist of it.” Jesse ignored his prickly attitude and leaned forward, letting his elbows rest on his knees. “Lemme guess, you tried falling back on familiar ground, unaware that Genji’d take it the wrong way ‘cause for a second there, you forgot where you were. Physically and… well… presently and all.”

“Placing foolish bets was once a favored pastime of his. This is not the first time I have told him such a habit is unseemly. He will not listen to reason.” Hanzo lowered his bow and looked at McCree over his shoulder, neither confirming or denying that Jesse was right. But he was answering him, holding a conversation. Jesse counted that as a win.

“I know he won’t, not unless that reason’s name is one Master Zenyatta. But will you?” He held out his hand from across the wide room, offering a mock handshake. “Nice to meet you, the name’s Reason. Reason McCree.” He partly closed his hand into a fist and shot a finger gun at the unimpressed archer and then pointed out the door. “Now go apologize.”

“Why should I?” Did Hanzo even know how much he sounded like a petulant child?

“You’re the big brother right? Be the bigger man, too. If you’re really aiming for bein’ able to hold hands and let bygones be bygones, that is.” _Which I still don’t believe._ McCree tacked on mentally, more for his own peace of mind than anything else. “Kumbaya and all that shit. Drop that pretty bow o’ yours and go make amends. Go on, get!”  

Too much. Hanzo cast him a withering look and went back to taking out his frustrations on innocent targets.

Voice light and aiming for casual, Jesse tried again. “I haven’t seen him mad like tha’ in ages. Didn’t think he still had it in him, since he went monk on us.”

“I bring out the worst in him.” Hanzo muttered regretfully, unintentionally voicing Jesse’s thought. His eyes didn’t stray from his marks. Jesse was sure he wasn’t supposed to have heard that. Louder, Hanzo added, “It is better to give us both time to reflect.”

McCree fell silent after that, simply watching as arrow after arrow landed at the center of the various targets with a dull _thump._ Hanzo knew he was there, but he didn’t say anything, didn’t ask him to leave. But having said his piece, he seemed intent on ignoring him, though.

They spent an hour like that, one disregarding the other’s existence, and the other doing just the opposite. McCree had eyes for nothing other than the form Hanzo cut against the dark grey walls of the range. Athena had the used arrows retrieved and returned to Hanzo, who took them out of a mobile cart with a quiet thanks and went back to shooting. McCree watched him, trying not to smile at the simple act of a man treating artificial intelligence with more civility than he afforded most real people. His mind was racing. Hanzo’d only been here two days, but every time the taciturn archer opened his mouth, he made it harder and harder for Jesse to pin him down. If this kept up, it was going to be one long month. Genji had mentioned that he had changed his mind about forcing Hanzo to join. Frustrated, McCree began tapping his foot against the leg of the bench, spurs jingling. He didn’t miss the increasingly annoyed expression forming on the other man’s face.

“Lemme ask you somethin’.” He said just as Hanzo opened his mouth to no doubt tell him off for his racket. He seemed even more peeved at not getting to voice his irritation.

“What?” He shot his last arrow and hopped the little fence to save Athena the trouble of having them collected.

“Why’d you let me win? Guy like you, I’d have thought pride woulda made you put me in my place for doubtin’ your skill like that.”

“True.” Hanzo replied, bent over, arrows in one hand and a quickly filling quiver in the other. He nimbly jumped back over the fence, stepped back from the firing point and offered nothing more. He folded his bow, walked over and placed it and his full quiver back into the case he had brought along. McCree watched from the next bench over, still waiting for more of an answer.

“And?” he prompted.

Hanzo didn’t even look at him, much less give him a response. He shouldered his equipment and marched out of the range doors, leaving a bewildered cowboy in his wake.

Taking a moment to come to terms with the fact that this day was getting to be just a bit much, Jesse sat. He stared at the spot on the ground between his spread legs and contemplated going after Genji, but decided against it. He had Zenyatta. He would be fine. With a grunt, he heaved himself off the bench, went to clean up the copper shells glinting on the floor of his firing point, and left the way Hanzo had.

Up the stairs, past a landing. He wandered over to the catwalk, down another set of stairs, drifted through hallways without a set destination in mind. When he walked past the labs, he saw Winston, Angela, and Mei speaking to some woman in a suit on the big screen over Winston’s desk. A UN rep, judging by the pin on her lapel. Jesse would help, but he never was all that good at diplomacy. He breezed past, and decided to go see how old Torbjörn was doing. He heard talk about a giant rogue omnic in a suffering town, and he wanted to hear the tale.

* * *

 

McCree spent the next week holed away with Torbjörn in his workshop. They got the training bots squared away the day after he was witness to the uncomfortable sibling squabble that led to neither ninja being seen together around the base for days.

Genji was seldom seen without Zenyatta. The omnic monk reassured McCree that Genji was fine on one evening when he looked especially tense and wouldn’t meet anyone’s eye. Still, the cyborg showed up for dinner, which was more than he could say for the brother. It seemed that the realization that the skies weren’t as clear as Genji promised had convinced Hanzo to avoid socializing like the plague. Mei mentioned one night in the middle of a video game tourney that he had been avoiding her as well.

The Watchpoint was big, with many places for a slighted pair to hide away, but Jesse had finally managed to spy two familiar silhouettes against the purple sunset atop of the cliffs while lugging around crates of supplies for Torbjörn. He figured that one of them had taken the advice of a certain voice of reason and talked things through. He liked to entertain the thought that he made a decent shrink, but in all probability, Genji had most likely been the one to offer an olive branch.

Once he had time to think, Jesse reached the conclusion that yeah, maybe arguments would be good for the brothers. Healthy even. As long as Hanzo kept those arrows to himself.

Other than Winston (who was perpetually busy), Lena (who was perpetually hanging around him), Lúcio, and potentially Mei-Ling, McCree was one of the only ones with a decent enough amount of knowledge about mechanics left to try to help Torbjörn get his turret system up and running. Not that Reinhardt didn’t try, but Torbjörn mainly used him to lift the heavy stuff. Lúcio was busy running tests outside on the turrets they had already built, smaller ones that would be mounted on the roofs.

At his and Reinhardt’s cajoling, their engineer in residence would sometimes shout a story or two over the loud banging and clanking of their combined effort. Torbjörn cut himself off in the middle of a tale about an omnium in Siberia and a local hero who gave up her shot at fame to defend her home when Jesse noisily dropped a large sheet of metal. His following noise of confusion was loud enough to be heard over the screeching metal of whatever Reinhardt was up to.

“What exactly are you doing?” Torbjörn asked, making his way past Reinhardt’s bulk bent over a huge crate to watch McCree over his shoulder.

“I don’t rightly know.” he admitted, tablet in one hand, pliers in the other, power drill held pinned under his armpit, and what he thought was the barrel of one of the guns nestled between his criss-crossed legs on the floor. He used the rubber handles of the pliers to scroll down the schematics on the tablet. “Thought I grabbed the right panel, but this ain’t fittin’ right. Reinhardt! You sure you gave me part E-7?”

“Yes!”

“Well then, what the fuck?” He dropped the power drill to hold the tablet with both hands and squint at the little blue and white picture. “Torbjörn, you sure this ain’t part of the neck?”

“Give me that.” Torbjörn grumbled, took the drill, and knocked Jesse’s hand aside when he tried to show him the tablet in case he needed the reference.

Five minutes later, there was a gun where McCree had had a wonky cylinder. Reinhardt walked over to pat a standing McCree sympathetically on the back.

“I know how to assemble Peacekeeper.” He muttered weakly in his own defense. Reinhardt assured him that it wasn’t him. It was Swedes and their inability to properly write out directions for building things. He took a well-aimed wrench to the back for his comment.

“Anyway, as I was saying before someone proved to be incompetent,” A one-eyed glare was directed at McCree, “You’d like this girl, Reinhardt. Real strong, holds her liquor well, almost as loud as you when she fights! And she fights well! She could beat you at arm wrestling!”

“No one can beat me at arm wrestling.” Answered the knight, in grave seriousness.

Mei-Ling walked in sometime later, coat wrapped around her waist and offering her help. “I am free for the rest of today! I just finished a debriefing with Winston and Mercy.”

“Debrief? On what?” Jesse asked, raising his voice to be heard.

“Oh, just things I found in some of the old Watchpoints.” She answered cryptically, but with a smile. Snowball floated around her in lazy u-shapes. Torbjörn greeted her cheerfully, and Jesse accused him of only being nice to the girls.

“Yeah, because they are not useless cowboys who have forgotten how to read a simple graphic. I’ll _be nice_ and blame it on how you’ve been here all day. You’re done. I’ll call you again when I need you. _Släng dig i väggen."_ [7] He got his point across by kicking McCree in the back of his legs, nearly making him buckle over.

“ _Pinche cabrón.”_ [8] Jesse laughed, straightening up. He reached down and flipped the old man’s beard into his face and ran away clutching his hat to his head before he could retaliate. Torbjörn’s yelling followed him out the doors and down the hall. Chuckling, he headed down to the dorms to pick up his body armor and give the range a visit. He had yet to take advantage of the training dummies by himself, laboring away as he had been. Heck, they hadn't even really been using them for the team sessions either.

As he made it past the first row of rooms, he saw a door on the very end of the hall open. He stopped. Out walked Hanzo, holding what McCree recognized as the case he kept his weapons in when they weren’t on his person.

He hadn’t actually spoken to the guy all week, despite seeing him here and there and in the simulations the entire team had to run. After being a sitting duck during the Shimada showdown, he had actually been a bit embarrassed to face either him or Genji. Not that he was ignoring them or anything, he saw Genji every evening at supper, and they chatted and joked with everyone else. And Hanzo ignored everyone enough for McCree to associate sightings of him around the base to be akin to spotting a ghost.

His fear for Genji had worn off after their argument. There were some nasty words thrown, but McCree did notice that Genji had been the one more likely to make it into something physical. Of course, given their history, McCree still had reason to worry. But he didn’t want to waste any more energy on hate that wasn’t his to feel. He had simply let his hate for the brother fall to the wayside. There was a lot to do, and by now his blatant dislike for the archer had gone from constant vigilance to wary glances whenever he could be bothered to remember to give them.

Well, now was as good a time as any to remind the man of his existence. Might as well pick up where they left off.

“Hey Shimada-san! You never answered my question! Why did you let me win?” He shouted across the hall with no preamble. Hanzo froze, hand still on the handle of his door. He looked up, caught his gaze, and huffed. Then he averted his eyes and promptly walked away. Ignored again, without even a polite hello. No surprise there.

Well, he had his bow on him. That meant they were heading for the same place. McCree walked into his room and began sifting through the mess of clothes on his floor in search for his chest plate. He ignored the familiar tingle that had settled on his fingers. A different thought crossed his mind.

“Miss Athena?”

“How may I assist you, Agent McCree?”

“Oh, it’s just a little thing, ma’am.” He found his chest plate and began the process of putting it on under his _sarape._ “Who’s on kitchen duty today?”

“Agent Genji has taken your turn for tonight, Agent McCree.”

He laughed. “Thank you kindly, miss.” he tipped his hat at the tiny speaker in the corner of the room. Not that she could see. They didn’t run surveillance in the quarters. He allowed himself a quick smoke before he left the comfort of his room. He left one of the windows open to air it out.

The range was empty save one social recluse of a sniper. The huge room was in simulation mode, walls erected to mimic building, roofs, sidewalks, the wonders of a modern city. McCree didn’t even make it two steps in before Hanzo acknowledged him, but McCree couldn’t see where he was.

“What do you want, cowboy?” Came an imperious voice from somewhere up above. Lord above, miracles were real. McCree didn’t even have to struggle to find an opening line.

“How’d you know it was me?” McCree walked over in the general direction of his voice after punching in his pin on the control panel. He eyed the current set-up to see what he was getting into. All hostile bots were powered on, the friendlies acting as civilians. A search and rescue. He checked Peacekeeper to make sure it was fully loaded, and then passed the point the hostile training bots were programmed not to cross. Still no sign of the archer. “The hell are you?”

“Has firing that gun of yours with no hearing protection caused you to go deaf?” The second time, McCree pinpointed where the voice was coming from. He met a training bot coming out the entrance when he passed a storefront, and had to kick it back to shoot it square between the eyes.

“Naw, wonders of modern science.” He spotted a fire escape and started climbing. “So it was the spurs, huh?”

“Do you actually wear those preposterous things to battle?” The sound of his voice was getting closer the higher he went. “The enemy would be able to hear you from kilometers away.” ”

“Well, yeah. I’ve got an image. Reckon you of all people would understand that.” He reached the roof and saw just what he had expected to see. Hanzo with his eyes scoping the ground, bowstring drawn, and with his entire left side out. “What with having your _yukata_ half off all the time.”

Hanzo scoffed and finally looked over at him, if briefly. “This is not a _yukata_ . It is a _kyudo-gi_ . And the purpose of the way I dress has nothing to do with aesthetic. Having a sleeve over my left arm would impair my aim.” The undertone of surprise in his voice told McCree he won points for at least knowing the word _yukata,_ even if he did use it wrong.

“Ah. Is that professional advice? One sharpshooter to another? So I should go rippin’ the sleeves off of all my shirts?”

“Do what you will, fool, but stay out of my way.” Hanzo caught sight of something and ran off, jumping from the building as if a twenty foot drop was no biggie. McCree jogged forward and just caught sight of Hanzo climbing down the last story of the barebones building to chase after a hostile that had one of the friendlies in its clutches. McCree nodded, then headed back to the fire escape.

Even if his intention for going down to the ranges was to get some practice in, McCree found himself shooting the bots that came at him out of reflex. His attention was on the archer that was quickly making his way through the simulation, moving faster than any of the bots could begin to compete with. He scaled buildings with ease, shooting from a balcony one minute and loping down a side alley the next. Nimble, like a cat. Or, well, a ninja. He could see Genji in the way Hanzo moved. An odd thought made him consider that maybe it was the other way around. Maybe it was Hanzo he saw in the way Genji moved.

It was something Genji used to say on missions before Overwatch fell. When Gabe loaned Jesse over to Jack, and he got to play with the real heroes. _I learned that from my brother._

His cumulative score would suffer for it, but at the moment, McCree was content to stand behind some cover and watch the elder Shimada rain punishment on the poor training bots that were only doing as they were programmed to.

When only three hostiles were left, he figured it was high time to kick it into gear. There was only one friendly left that Hanzo hadn’t yet secured. McCree had run this sim before. He knew the other bots would have holed up in the building in the corner of the range by the entrance.

But telling the fellow would be cheating. Acting on that knowledge himself, though? Still cheating, but that wasn’t going to stop him.

He was about to break into a run, but movement atop the low roofs of the buildings stopped him before he even took off. There ran Hanzo, heading towards where McCree knew the last three targets would be waiting. Biting back a bewildered laugh, he ran after him along the sidewalk.

He entered the ‘town hall’ of the simulation just in time to see Hanzo twist and slam his bow across the face of a bot that had rushed at him. He followed up with a kick to its middle, slashing the arrow in his hand across its exposed neck. A noise from behind a desk alerted him to turn just as the second bot stood, gun firing plastic pellets that still hurt like a bastard if they managed to land a hit.

Hanzo side-stepped, evading the shots and Jesse had to do the same to make sure they didn’t hit him. Hanzo ducked, ran forward while nocking an arrow at his side, raised his arms and made the shot at point-blank range, the force of the arrow pushing clean through the bot and pinning it to the wall. The friendly captive was sitting behind the desk as well, and Hanzo tapped it on the head with the end of his bow on the button that alerted Athena to mark it as safe.

There was still the matter of the third. Usually it would have come down the flight of stairs before the desk bot made its appearance. And it did, lumbering down as quietly as a metal bot could. Which was actually pretty quiet. McCree wouldn’t have noticed it if he hadn’t been watching for it.  

Hanzo shot it without even having to look back. And fuck him if that wasn’t the damn most-

“Simulation complete. Well done, Shimada Hanzo.” Athena interrupted McCree’s thoughts.

The tingling was back in his fingers. He wanted to feel the familiar weight of his gun, but there was nothing left to shoot at. Hanzo was too quick. This time, the question came out in a sincerely nonplussed voice. “Why did you let me win?”

With a heavy exhale through the nose, Hanzo pushed past McCree, who had been partially blocking the door in his state of awe.

The feeling of a bare arm shoving at his metal one brought McCree back to his senses. He redistributed his weight to keep from being tipped over. “Well damn, sweetie. Don’t mind me, I just got here.” He walked after him. Athena was already clearing the field, the buildings folding in on themselves and becoming part of the floor. The groan and screeching of moving metal almost made Jesse miss the response thrown at him.

“I do mind.” Hanzo paused, and seemed to think his answer needed further deliberation. He resumed walking and went on. “You are loud, and your only redeeming quality is that you did as told and kept to yourself. Following me like a shadow. You are a nuisance.” They reached the entrance to the sim, and Hanzo stopped to fold his weapons back into the case he had left propped against the control panel.

McCree stiffened, inexplicably hurt by the scathing remark. _Did as told._ It’s not like he had obeyed on purpose. _Que mandón._ [9] “Well you’re a… you, uh…” He floundered, still replaying the fight in his head. Arms casually moving back to draw an arrow back and shoot a target based on auditory sense alone. The projectile launched from the maws of a dragon.

“Yes?” It sounded like a threat, but it was said without much care. Like Hanzo didn’t figure McCree could be just as mean. Besides, what kind of insult could McCree come up with to even phase the archer? As Hanzo began the process of inputting shutdown commands into the range control panel, Jesse looked him over, desperate to think of something just as biting. But all his eyes could settle on was the rise and fall of Hanzo’s chest as he caught his breath after the exertion of the exercise.

“You’re…”

It was completely unnecessary to have half of one’s chest exposed. Wholly superfluous.

“...Pretty handy with that bow.” He purred, and then froze all over again. That did not come out in the tone of voice Jesse was comfortable directing at Hanzo Shimada. Luckily, the man in question didn’t seem to notice, only giving him a short hum to indicate he had heard Jesse at all, and continued powering off the range impassively. He thanked _Jesus, Jose, y Maria_ that they were alone and that no one had heard his blunder.[10]

“McCree!” Torbjörn barked in his ear. Jesse jumped in surprise then winced at the volume. He pressed at his comm to answer.

“What?” He said, using a normal volume in hope he would take the hint.

No such luck. Over the sound of machinery and music in the background, and no doubt with Reinhardt’s influence, Torbjörn thought he had to yell to be heard. “Quit your damn flirting and come help me!”

If Jesse’s face turned a couple shades redder, it was out of indignation. Purely. “What? You just kicked me out! And what the hell’re you on about?”

“Lena’s here, along with her silly little tablet. She likes to watch the cameras.”

“And?” The camera feed didn’t include audio. How the hell did Torbjörn know about his momentary fuck-up?

“Don’t insult us and play coy, boy. Fix your damn face. We’ve known you long enough to know exactly what you’re doing. Lúcio’s done with the tests. It’s time to put these beauties up! Get your ass to my workshop or I’ll have Athena broadcast me on the speakers and I’ll embarrass you in front of chicken legs over there.”

Jesse didn’t need telling twice. With a tip of his hat and a quick apology, he bolted.

* * *

 

Genji sought him out a few days later. A sunny morning out by the cliffs while Jesse did routine checks on the state of the turrets as Torbjörn had asked (ordered) him to. The cyborg opened the conversation with an eager, “You have been speaking with my brother?”

“Wuh?” Jesse answered intelligently. The wind picked up, a gust threatening to knock the hat off his head. He held it down with his tablet and stylus.

“He mentioned you earlier.” Genji explained. The wind made his scarf snap behind his head like a pennant. “He said you followed him into the training range the other day. Annoyed as he is, I appreciate that you seem to be taking what I said to heart.”

The conversation in the hall the day his brother had arrived clicked in Jesse’s brain. The force of the wind shoved him forward. His red _sarape_ waved like a flag in the space between them. “Oh! Naw, Genji-kun, it ain’t that. I just wanted to see the man shoot again.”

Genji gave a thoughtful hum. “He is good with his bow.” He settled on, and made McCree sputter and wonder what exactly Hanzo had told him to have him come out with those exact words.

But it seemed to be a mere coincidence. Genji just looked at him, waiting for McCree to pick the conversation back up. The gulls cried out loud overhead, a challenge to the gall of nature for daring to knock them off-course.

“I’m a simple man, what can I say?” he hesitantly said.

“You mean to say you are easily impressed.” Genji was amused. Jesse could tell by the tilt of his head.

“Easily?!” He leaned back to look at Genji up and down, “You say tha’ like that wasn’t the finest shootin’ since Amari herself!” He gestured in the direction of the training ranges.

“Easily impressed and modest.” Genji laughed. “You give yourself too little credit. Didn’t you match Amari-san?”

“Well yeah but I ain’t no sniper. It’s different.”

“If you say so.” Genji relented, obviously unconvinced. The sun set his metal frame to shining like the ocean on a bright morning. He looked well. His relationship with his brother appeared to truly be on the mend.

* * *

 

A couple of days passed, and Mei mentioned in passing over dinner that she was glad to have someone to run numbers by. Hanzo was apparently very good at geometry and balancing out chemical equations. It was more necessary for climate science that McCree would have thought. Not that he understood anything about climate science, and he didn’t very much want to understand it. But what he did understand was that if Hanzo was talking to Mei again, then things really were fine between the brothers.

At the two week mark, Jesse was putting away leftovers from a late night dinner while Lúcio complimented Genji’s cooking as he washed the dishes. Speakers were set up, pumping music that was making Jesse too awake for that time of night. The DJ’s beats worked better than caffeine. He’d have to download a few of his works onto his phone. Straightening up, he caught a glimpse of a familiar ghost clad in blue walk past the mess hall doors. Jesse slammed the fridge door closed and told Lúcio to hold that thought as he rushed out the same door.

Hanzo had stopped in the middle of the hall leading towards the dorms when he heard McCree’s spurs approach.

“What do you want, cowboy?” He didn’t even turn all the way around to face him. His neck did most of the work.

“Why did you let me win!?” He asked. He whined. “Come on, Shimada-san! Just tell me! It’s been eatin’ away at me!”

“I did not do it for you, if that is what you suspect.”

McCree let out an incredulous laugh. “Honestly? Have you met yourself? I know it ain’t! I’m waitin’ for the other shoe to drop. You helped me there and you’re gonna hafta forgive me if I don’t believe it was outta the goodness of yer heart.”

Hanzo was silent. He didn’t want to say whatever it was he was thinking of saying, and once again Jesse mentally braced himself for some insult. An affirmation that Hanzo had done it out of pity, or to torture the gunslinger with the knowledge that he wasn’t all that.

“I was… simply repaying a kindness.” Hanzo answered slowly, quietly. With all the honesty he always spoke with, but this time it wasn’t tempered by some breed of discontent.

Jesse waited. There had to be a catch. He couldn’t recall having done the man a single kindness. He wracked his brain for a memory to put to what Hanzo had said. One beat of became two. Two became three. Suddenly, the silence was uncomfortable. “Really?” He blurted.

“Yes.” Hanzo said, almost earnestly. Then he switched tones, “That I managed to annoy my brother and earn the opportunity to chastise him in the process is mere coincidence. Not what I was aiming for at all,” He paused, color momentarily rising in his cheeks, “No matter how badly it backfired. But that is over and dealt with.”

Was that…. sarcasm?

“Wuh?”

“Now,” Suddenly, Hanzo sounded tired. Exhausted to have to put up with Jesse’s antics. “If you have nothing further to accost me with, I will take my leave.” And he did just that, taking off down the hall. Jesse watched him go.

“Oh!… Um… alright.” Still reeling slightly, Jesse added a meek, _“Buenas noches_?”

Hanzo stopped and craned his neck back to watch him. “What?” Suspicion evident in his voice. As if Jesse were taking the opportunity to get back at him for calling him a nuisance.

“It means good night.” _You prickly son of a gun,_ he didn’t add. This felt an awful lot like progress, and he wasn’t gonna muck it up now.

Hanzo considered him with narrowed eyes. Then he nodded, the motion reminiscent of a small bow. _"Oyasumi nasai."_ [11]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know last time i said that the typhoon wasnt fucking around and it wasnt but this new one is somehow not fuckin around even MORE and i now know exactly at what mph wind starts to truly terrify me. 
> 
> [1]Yes  
> [2]No  
> [3]I shoot just as well as y- no, you. (Hanzo stopped himself from using the disrespectful ‘omae’, and changed to the neutral ‘anata’)  
> [4]Seeing is believing  
> [5]An ass-kisser! (sycophant)  
> [6]Big brother (very respectful, but Genji here uses it like an insult)  
> [7]Apparently, Swedes don’t say “get lost”, they say “throw yourself into a wall”  
> [8]Fucking asshole  
> [9]How bossy/What a bossy person  
> [10]Jesus, John, and Mary  
> [11]Good night  
> 


	7. A Global Scale Blame Game

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The desert flower that I am is not accustomed to being cold in October. I am gonna die come winter.
> 
> See end notes for English translations, hover over text if you're on pc for the japanese kanji

When the time came for Lúcio, Zenyatta, and Hanzo to stand in front of Winston and hand over their handhelds and earpieces to be given higher clearance as official Overwatch members, the old agents threw a party.

They took advantage of the balmy late June afternoon and set up outside on a wide terrace overlooking the Alboran Sea. Reinhardt baked a cake, Angela provided a tray of chopped vegetables and a cheese fondue pot. McCree made a salsa that everyone save Mei and Lúcio were too afraid to try. Mei provided the chips, which were only slightly burnt around the edges. Genji and Lena tried their hand at barbecuing, only to be kicked away from the grill by Torbjörn, who had exchanged his claw for a set of elongated tongs. The dejected pair broke out a keg from somewhere inside the base instead. Sloshing, overfull pints were passed around with gusto. 

Athena did her best, but Lúcio took over the role of house DJ without being asked. He set up his equipment with Lena’s help and a quick visit down to his room. The most enthusiastic dancer turned out to be Reinhardt, with Lena and Genji making a valiant effort to keep up. Zenyatta floated peacefully to and fro, mingling amidst his new teammates and asking interesting questions about the crafting process of the little figures atop the cake, complementing Reinhardt on the dexterity and patience necessary to make such fragile masterpieces.

“Have you ever considered meditation? I believe you would prove quite adept.” Hanzo overheard the omnic suggest to the knight. Reinhardt answered by laughing loudly and telling him he couldn’t scale those craggy cliffs if he had Mercy’s wings.

Hanzo turned his attention to Mei, who was trying to offer Angela a tortilla chip with a sizeable dollop of green salsa perched on the tip. Angela made a calculated retreat, engaging Genji in a conversation about-

Him.

“I am truly glad for you, Genji. For you both. Things have been going well, I assume?”

“Yes, Angela-sama.” his brother nodded, “I am overjoyed he has decided to stay with us after all.”

“With you, you mean.” Mei grinned. Genji nodded again.

“Yes, with me. And you. And everyone on the team.” Genji turned his head to look over his shoulder, at where Hanzo was standing alone in the corner of where the limestone face of the Rock of Gibraltar met the man made structure of the Watchpoint. Hanzo nodded his acknowledgment. Genji returned the gesture and turned back to the doctor. 

Hanzo watched the group of nine gathered around him and didn’t feel at home, but he didn’t feel uncomfortable either. Well, no more uncomfortable than social gatherings managed to make him on principle. But it seemed his new team members knew him well enough to leave him be, and so small talk was at least not one of his troubles. It was… quaint. A nice gesture. Lúcio was enjoying it, and although the omnic didn’t eat, he seemed appreciative. A month had given them all time to grow accustomed to one another. The one who most counted as a stranger was himself, and that was by his own preference. Despite his decision to stay, he wouldn’t allow himself to grow attached should something happen and he be forced to leave. There was still a matter of the Shimada-gumi’s assassins, and the UN refusing them sanction. If Overwatch was only meant to fall apart later on and repeat history, Hanzo didn’t want to waste sentiment on calling it “home”.

He looked down at the amber liquid swirling lazily in his tankard. This wasn’t home, but Genji was here. There was little else left for him outside Gibraltar, and what had been the point of leaving the Shimada-gumi if he didn’t stay with Genji now that the gods had seen fit to return him? He restlessly tapped the rectangular communicator resting heavy against his thigh, tucked in the pocket of his _hakama_.

Any reluctance he had initially had to refuse Genji’s offer of retracting his debt had fled when he realized they could build something new here. Away from the roles their birth had forced upon them, surrounded by people who would see Genji be free instead of caged. With those thoughts in mind, and days spent meditating and training at his brother’s side, Hanzo believed he had managed to begin to find his way towards peace.

Hanzo looked up from the beer in his hand to find the object of his thoughts standing in front of him.

 _“Nani yatten no?”_ Genji asked, head tilted to the side. Hanzo noticed that he wasn’t eating either. He didn’t even know if his brother still required any nourishment as a cyborg. He didn’t know if his brother could even eat in the first place. The topic of Genji’s new anatomy was one Hanzo hadn’t yet been comfortable or brave enough to breach.

 _“Kangaeteru.”_ Hanzo relented.

 _“Nani o kangaeteru no?”_ Genji pressed, as nosy as the child he still was to Hanzo’s memory.

_“Betsu ni…”_

_“Hanzo.”_ Genji leaned into his space and shoved at his shoulder in an attempt to convince him to share with the class. Hanzo let a smirk tug at the edge of his lips. He brought his bare arm up to take a drink.

 _“Boku no urusai otōto.”_ He answered after taking a long draw. [1]

 _"Nī-chan,_ be serious.” Genji laughed and leaned into the rock next to him. “Unless that’s what you were actually thinking. Then I don’t want to hear it. Instead let me ask you, how is it? Being an official member of Overwatch? How does it feel? Does anything surprise you?”

“I have only been an agent for a couple of hours, Genji.” he sniffed.

“And what a lively couple of hours they have been! Not that you would know, hanging in the corner like a bat!” he scolded, “Now answer the question. What are you thinking? There must be something that strikes you!”

After a moment of serious thought, Hanzo settled on an answer. He eyed Mei and McCree, who were on Lena’s heels, each brandishing a chip laden with salsa. _“Tōchi de boku no kokoro o utsu mono to ieba, minna ga shinsetsuna koto.”_ [2]

Genji followed his gaze and said nothing in response. For that, Hanzo was thankful. The silence between them was comfortable and light. Either one of them could begin a conversation, and the other would fall into it readily and willingly. But they both chose not to, letting peace settle between them, one observing his friends, the other observing the makings of a decent combat force. Two members of said combat force broke away from the rest to approach them. One, with a colorful bowl of lightly salted baked corn tortilla chips. The taller with a curious little black stone bowl on four legs.

“No.” Hanzo answered before McCree and Mei could ask their question.

“Hanzo!” Mei whined. Despite the heat, she still wore her coat and boots. Her glasses were resting atop her bangs, the humidity of the early evening making them fog up if she wore them properly.

“Aw, come on Shimada-san! At least lemme ask before you go turnin’ a man down like that!” McCree was not wearing his _sarape,_ a word Hanzo was determined to keep locked in his memory lest the cowboy take up his threat and go back to calling his _gi_ a _yukata_ if Hanzo accidentally referred to it as a ratty blanket ever again. His ever present hat was still on his shaggy head, but the leather pants were replaced by simple jeans. The chaps were missing as well. But not the boots and the absurd belt.

“I am fond of my palate. I do not wish to ruin it for a simple challenge, and much less for your amusement.”

“Chicken.” he said, and then muttered under his breath about the Japanese and their bland food. Mei swatted him on the arm and told him to be nice.

“Hey!” Genji protested, knowing full well McCree was referring to his cooking. Hanzo jumped to his brother’s defense.

“I seem to recall Genji mentioning you refused to eat wasabi on account of it ‘havin’ too much of a goddamn bite’.” Hanzo raised both eyebrows at McCree, and tilted his head back to look the cowboy in the eye, making the challenge obvious. Genji snickered next to him. McCree seemed to be struggling to keep a straight face at Hanzo’s attempt to copy his accent. Hanzo took no offense. He had mostly done it for his current company’s amusement, much in contrast to his excuse from moments ago.

“That brand of torture hardly counts as a valid flavor.” he defended. Genji grumbled a threat about sneaking some onto his dinner plate, and this time Mei sent the discipling smack at Genji’s middle. She turned to Hanzo and offered him the bowl of chips.

“These are not too bad by themselves, if you’d like. They are a bit salty, though…” She smiled. He plucked a chip from her bowl and assured her it was fine on the salt.

“I will not stand here and have my talent as a cook insulted. Give me that.” From the corner of his eye, Hanzo saw Genji swipe the black bowl from McCree’s cupped hands before he even finished his sentence. In the middle of swallowing a mash of tortilla chip, Hanzo turned just in time to clearly see his brother’s hand reach up and remove his visor and mask, shoving them at a bemused McCree before he lunged towards Mei past Hanzo to grab a handful of chips.

 

_His face._

 

If merely catching a glance of his deceased brother’s eyes had tormented Hanzo’s dreams for the better part of two months, then the sight of Genji’s face would fuel nightmares for years to come. A breath caught in his throat, and he ceased to function.

There was mottled scarring running from the right side of his face, diagonally reaching the inner tip of his left eyebrow. Off-color synthetic skin kept the left side of his jaw together, the neat patch job still not matching the paleness of Genji’s natural skin. A large portion of his nose was also obviously doctored, and the sallow way one cheek hung spoke for the fact that Dr. Angela Ziegler had been too occupied trying to keep her ward’s heart beating to mind such petty things as cosmetics.

 

Still, it was _Genji._

 

Gibraltar disappeared as Hanzo fell back against what had moments before been limestone, but was now the gnarled trunk of a tree. The ground before him was shining in the moonlight, rich and glistening with blood. In his hand, he felt the grip of his _katana,_ even as he saw it lying on the ground next to the prone figure of his little brother bleeding out on the grass on a quiet night in Hanamura.

 

_He couldn’t breathe._

 

“This is not that spicy, McCree!” A cyborg stood where his brother’s corpse should have been.

“Genji-kun, you and I both know your taste buds’re shot, you ain’t no one to judge. I came here to get your brother, not you.” said a voice that had no business being there.

Gibraltar and Hanamura were merging. The noise of the waves and Lúcio’s music intermingled with the ringing of cicadas in the summer.

“Hanzo?” Another voice that didn’t belong. _Mei,_ his brain supplied even as it sent him deeper into the recesses of his memory. Deeper into hell. “Hanzo, are you alright?”

A shattered tankard of beer joined the mirage of Genji lying dead on the floor, green eyes open and staring blankly at the hazy purple Spanish sunset. Hanzo still had enough of himself left to recognize that what was surely some form of panic attack couldn’t even keep its facts straight. Genji had been facedown when Hanzo last brought his sword down to-

“Oh shit.” The clatter of dropped metal. A big hand clasped around his shoulder, another under his chin, tilting his face up. “Fuck, Genji, I think he’s having a-”

He shoved the hands away and covered his mouth before the beer already in his system could join the beer spilled on the floor. He ran.

* * *

 

There was whispering outside the door to his room. An argument, centered around the merits of leaving him to his privacy for a while and the danger of not checking on him.

Hanzo sat against the foot of his bed, head thrown back and resting on rumpled bedsheets. In his mouth lingered the unpleasant taste of bile. He glared at the thin sliver of light beneath the door, the only intruder upon the darkness he had slowly come to be surrounded on as a sky outside his open window morphed from purple to black. He felt empty. He felt trapped.

“I do not want to leave him alone.” Genji was saying softly.

He didn’t want them, any of them. Not his brother, and not a bright-eyed woman that meant well. Definitely not the cowboy. The door was bolted shut, status on the outside placard set to ‘Do Not Disturb’. His communicators had been thrown against a wall, the screen of the handheld cracked in a series of spiderwebs that ran from one corner to the opposite. His earpiece had rolled under the bed.

Mei suggested getting Dr. Ziegler. Genji suggested Zenyatta. McCree, who he only knew to be out there by the sound of those stupid spurs coming down the hall and stopping outside his door, had been strangely silent.

“This ain’t the first time he’s had to face his demons, Genji-kun.” The cowboy finally spoke up, “I say leave the man be. Athena, can you at least monitor his vitals?”

“Agent Hanzo has removed his communicator. I do not have access to his vitals.”

Hanzo hadn’t been aware the earpiece measured such things. He absently filed it away as important information for another time.

“Well, that settles it. The man obviously doesn’t wanna be disturbed. Come on, Genji-kun. He made it ten years. One night ain’t gonna kill him.”

“But he does not have to be alone any longer! I can- ”

“Probably only make it worse.” McCree assured gently, and a robotic sigh followed.

The shuffling of footsteps retreating down the hallway. Hanzo let out a heavy exhale.

What was he doing here? Why had he decided to stay? Genji had given him an out. He tried to recall the feeling of certainty that had blanketed him hours before. The feeling that had settled when his mind assured him that what was left of the house of Shimada could build again, build anew.

Genji had been new. Just different enough for the past and present to meet at a halfway point, for them to begin to heal. But Genji wasn’t new, wasn’t different. He had grown and changed because he had been forced to. Forced to just as the clan had tried to force, but that Hanzo had unwittingly been the catalyst too. Hanzo was the reason for the scars making Genji’s once handsome face into something unsettling and grotesque.

Genji wasn’t new. He had been reborn, risen from his early grave like the reanimated corpses of the video games he used to play. The result of the well-intentioned wonders of modern medicine, a digital rendering in Biohazard.

The minutes ticked by. Hanzo tried to regulate his breathing. Slowly, he calmed.

There was a noise outside his door, sudden and unexpected. Quiet clinking, a digital beep, and suddenly the door was sliding open. There knelt McCree, unlit cigarillo hanging from his mouth and dressed in full gear. The light from his chest plate glowing dimly in the dark of Hanzo’s room.

“How did you…?” Hanzo startled and pulled himself together. He hastened to stand, to slam the door in McCree’s face, do something.

“Blackwatch taught me a thing or two.” he answered, standing up and walking into Hanzo’s room like he owned the place and didn’t require such a frivolous thing as permission.

Hanzo didn’t know what Blackwatch was. At the moment, he didn’t much care.

“I will have to report this to Winston, Agent McCree.” Athena intoned dutifully.

“Duly noted, ma’am. Thanks for the heads up.” he answered the AI easily.

“You were the one who suggested leaving me in peace. Why are you here?” Hanzo growled. McCree at least had the sense to slide the door shut behind him.

“For the sake of progress.” Hanzo leveled him with an angry look, encouraging him to make sense or make himself scarce. McCree gave a sigh and invited himself to the center of his room. “I’m just checkin’ in to see if you have any alcohol or similar vices up in this here room. After I’ve done my sweep, I’ll be out of your hair, don’t you worry.”

Wordlessly, Hanzo pointed at the bedside table to the gourd that usually hung against his hip. He had removed it once the temptation became too great. Queasiness aside, he didn’t deserve the relief a dimming of his senses promised. McCree’s suspicions were unfounded. Hanzo had no desire to drown himself in the comfort of oblivion.

“Ah.” McCree reached down to take it. “Well, it seems I jumped the gun on that one. You don’t have the looks of a man lookin’ to give himself alcohol poisoning.”

Hanzo didn’t answer him. He looked to the door as pointedly as he could manage and kept his mouth clamped shut. McCree looked a bit sheepish.

“Right, sorry to have so rudely intruded upon your solitude here, Shimada-san. I’ll… uh… be heading out then. Won’t barge in uninvited again.” He rushed to make his exit.

Once he safely reached the door, Hanzo stopped him. “Wait ” he gritted out. “Thank you. For stopping him.”

McCree paused with his hand on the door handle. “Well, if you got triggered by what I think you did, then I have a feeling our friendly neighborhood Green Cyborg Ninja Dude wouldn’ta been the best comfort. Just tryin’ to keep the peace.” He turned around to gauge Hanzo’s mood, and froze by whatever emotion he saw that Hanzo had failed to bury. “Aw hell, sweetie. Was I off the mark again? Should I go get your brother?”

Hanzo shook his head, but when he opened his mouth to order him to leave, he couldn’t force the words out. He fixed his gaze on the floor. McCree shuffled uncomfortably.

“Well, er, in tha’ case… I hafta be on a transport in twenty minutes, but…” He stood as close to the barrier the door provided as possible. He remembered his manners. “Do you mind if I come in?”

“Is there a mission?” Hanzo asked.

McCree laughed, still awkwardly hanging by the door with the gourd in hand. “Naw, I wish. Winston just got word from New York. They’re calling a hearing to alter the Petras Act. Some real bad shit went down with Helix in Giza.”

Genji was an established member of Overwatch. The United Nations would have him in their files. “Who has been called to go?” he asked.

“Winston, Angela, Lena. Mei’s tagging along as a reminder that we still do heroic stuff, with her thing in Antarctica. Lúcio has to go because Vishkar’s accusing us of harboring criminals. And, heh, well, me. ‘Cause I’m an actual criminal.” He said it without a care, like stating the sky had turned green and it was only natural. He leaned against the closed door. “Should be back in a few days, either with a new set of accords to sign, or to clear out the base and move somewhere underground.”

“Winston would continue heading Overwatch even if the UN prohibited it?”

McCree shrugged. “Would you leave if he did?” he asked. Then, he thought of a better question. “Are ya? Leaving?” He nodded at the cracked handheld behind Hanzo on the floor. “Thought you’d crossed that bridge, sweetie.”

“Stop calling me that.” Hanzo said without much bite, and left the question unanswered. No, he was not leaving, but his head was still pounding, and now he had something else to think about. McCree glanced at the alarm clock on his bedside table.

“Listen, so, you good or…?”

“I am not keeping you here. I would actually prefer it if you left.” This time, the irritation in his voice was obvious.

“You look like you’ve been rode hard and put up wet, there, Shimada-san. I can’t really leave in good conscience after making my grand entrance.” He looked at the clock again, and Hanzo did as well. Twelve minutes. “Sit down, at least.”

Hanzo sat at the edge of his bed, then nodded at the door. McCree ran a hand across his face. He didn’t leave. He reached up to press at his comm and murmur, “Yeah, I’m on my way.” to whoever was on the line. He reached over to the nearest shelf and deposited the gourd.

“Just, don’t let this set you both back. I don’t wanna go from hoppin’ out the frying pan onto the fire when this damn legal dispute is over.” he implored. Well meaning and earnest.

“You didn’t seem bothered.” Hanzo looked up to meet McCree in the eye as he spoke of the elephant in the room. He found the cowboy clutching his hat over his heart.

“Bothered?”

“By his…” He let the sentence taper on, hoping McCree could piece it together himself.

“What, his face? Naw. He eats sometimes, whenever someone comes up with something new. Oh. Aw, shit. You never come to dinner! You wouldn’t have…”

Hanzo shook his head.

“But, I mean, you knew he can cook.” McCree’s voice had turned disbelieving. How foolish of Hanzo not to linger on the reality surrounding his brother’s bodily functions.

“We were taught to cook in school. It is part of everyone’s curriculum. Of course he can cook.”

“Well I’ll be damned. That in all the schools in Japan?”

Curiosity piqued, Hanzo asked, “Do schools in America not teach students how to keep house?”

“Pfft, naw. Pretty sure parents would mount a riot if kids hadda do a lick of manual labor in schools.” He let out a short laugh at the very notion. It was deep, and pleasant. Calming.

They both looked to the clock. Five minutes. “Tell ya what, we’ll pick this up when we get back.” He paused, and grinned. A feral slash across his scruffy face. “That’s if the States let me back outta the damn country. Catch ya at team practice?” McCree ducked his head and tugged his hat back into place.

“I suppose.”

McCree was delayed when the edge of his _sarape_ caught in the door when it slid closed. Hanzo had to stand up to open it and free him when the lock latched shut behind him. When the sound of his spurs died away, Hanzo recalled that he hadn’t heard the cowboy approach his room. It seemed he could afford to be stealthy when he wished to.

* * *

 

Genji knocked on his door after lunch the next day to invite him to sit in with the rest of them as they watched the Security Council gather in New York. Reinhardt and Torbjörn had dragged part of the recreational room’s couch up to Winston’s lab. Zenyatta hovered over an abandoned tire. Genji and Hanzo took a spot on the floor and didn’t speak of what happened the night before. Genji explained that the UN was only giving them streaming access to the trial because Reinhardt and Torbjörn were part of the original line-up, and Winston had requested they be kept in the loop. Both of the old men had their comms connected to Winston in case they had any input on the proceedings that needed to be voiced. Just because they had volunteered to stay behind at the base didn’t mean they weren’t just as invested with the outcome of the trial.

First to stand was Dr. Ziegler, who assured the nations gathered that she knew that the Petras Act was justified, but in light of current events, she believed that Overwatch was needed once more by a world at the brink of chaos. She was backed by a representative from Helix, a captain who had gained her title with the death of her commander during the breach in Giza. The representative was a tall military woman with a mid-length bob of dark hair, with a tattoo under her right eye. Accusations flew left and right, connections with past members and the like. The woman simply stared down those gathered and implored they think about the state of a world where even Helix was taking notice of something sinister lurking in the shadows of their home base.

Winston was next. He succinctly explained the attack on the Watchpoint, their belief of terrorist (specifically Talon) involvement, the nearly jeopardized files of information. Then Mei stood up and gave testimony and evidence of recent tampering found within the databases of defunct Watchpoints, where thankfully there had been no traces of a breach. The person under suspicion was a vigilante, supposedly American, who had also been spotted in the Canadian Watchpoint, and as far down as Mexico. There were speculations that he was moving east.

“Renowned reporter Olympia Shaw has undergone investigation of the man, this Soldier: 76. She believes his identity may be Jack Morrison. Morrison is still under suspicion for the tragedy that occurred in the Overwatch headquarters in Geneva. What do you have to say, Agent Winston?” Asked the Chinese representative, her English translation running into Winston’s answer.

Reinhardt made an angry noise from his spot on the couch, and Torbjörn was quick to echo it. Genji sat silently. Hanzo mourned the loss of his handheld when he couldn’t pull it out to look up information on the former strike commander.

“Pure speculation. Rumors about Morrison’s and Reyes’ survival have grown wild over the years. There were funerals. We all attended. Our former commanders are dead. That era of Overwatch is over. We are here to ask to be given the opportunity to begin afresh.” There was an angry finality to the gorilla’s tone, and the subject wasn’t brought up again.

Lena was asked to step forward and defend her uninvolvement with Tekhartha Mondatta’s assassination. Zenyatta’s meditative pose slackened as he leaned forward to watch attentively. They watched as she in turn was backed by the representative of the UK, who assured their law enforcement had witnessed Tracer attempting to neutralize the threat, not cause it.

They sat for hours, each country mentioning an agent doing good here, causing property damage there, and wildly fluctuating public concern.

A hard light hologram of a tall Indian man called upon Lúcio. Next to him stood a stiff looking architech, her posture straight and rigid. She stood haughtily at the projection’s side, casting cool glances at the various agents in attendance. She was assessing them. Hanzo didn’t like the way her eyes lingered on their audio medic. They accused him of trespassing and destruction of private property, as well as possession of stolen Vishkar tech. The rest of Overwatch was quick to defend him, but not as quick as Lúcio.

“Excuse me, Mr. Korpal.” He spoke respectfully, but Hanzo could tell the he was upset. “But I don’t believe it’s fair to call it trespassing if that was the _favela_ I was born in. The _favela_ you forced the mayor’s hand to secede to you. The _favela_ you and your people,” he gave a nod towards the architech, “were no longer welcome in.” 

The architech, who had been silent for the duration of her supervisor’s speech, finally spoke up. And when she did, she directed her criticism at Winston. 

“It reflects badly on your organization to recruit an individual with criminal ties. His presence is evidence that you are complicit in aiding a fugitive of the law.” She stated in a cool, detached voice. Winston thanked her politely for her input, but remained firm that Lúcio was a valuable asset to the team, and Vishkar had no jurisdiction to take him away. The feed went back to Lúcio, and McCree could be seen pointedly looking between himself and the music idol sitting next to him. 

“Alright, we’re all thinkin’ it.” He gave the architech his best charming smile and leaned back into his chair with his arms crossed against his broad chest. “Honey, that statement shoulda been in the plural.” All the microphones in the area picked up his quip.

 _That isn’t helping._ Hanzo thought tiredly and reached for a diagram lying on Winston’s desk. Mei’s endothermic blaster was printed on it, labels on various parts and notes concerning upgrades. Hanzo found a pencil and added that he should look into ways of lessening the recoil, since Mei struggled with aim while she was running. Then he poked around the desk in search for a calculator to double check one of the equations. Genji leaned in closer, dug his hand in a drawer, and emerged with an antiquated grey calculator. Hanzo took it and asked after paper, which he received from a rusty cabinet two steps away.

The representatives turned to McCree next, and he gave an account about a suspicious object on a train, and even more suspicious suspects who had been very determined to kill everyone in their quest to getting it.

“So I tossed it off one of the cars. Some folks got right spooked, but no one died. I really just was in the wrong place at the right time.” McCree told his tale, complete with hand gestures.

Hanzo rolled his eyes and plucked a textbook from Winston’s desk. Genji made a noise of disgust at the reading material and went over to join his master in meditation. Athena apologized for interrupting and politely asked if Hanzo wished to be added to the dinner rotation from the comm in his ear. He considered saying no. He didn’t want to have any responsibilities beyond what was expected of him as an agent. But Genji seemed so relieved whenever Hanzo went out of his way to interact with the others. Hanzo didn't look up from his spot on the book as he gave Athena a quiet yes. He didn’t know an AI could sigh in relief, but she did. She told him he was to take Lena’s turn tonight.

* * *

 

The UN would allow Overwatch a tentative three months’ probation. In that time, they were only to recruit one agent a month, a fact which Genji snickered at. The UN would have oversight of who got recruited, and there had to be a protocol concerning background checks. Genji laughingly told him and Zenyatta that they had made it just in time. Furthermore, any mission of any sort, be it intel or recon, had to be approved. They would be given missions by the UN, which they had to accept, and Winston had to record briefings and mission reports to send back to Geneva, who would be tasked to be their overseer in New York’s stead.

With the UN’s backing came funds, and protection from the media’s drones hovering just beyond their grounds. They would be getting paychecks. The group left behind in Gibraltar cheered.

With the UN’s backing came restrictions and endless red tape. Helix was to help monitor between open communication, and there were talks of sending one of their agents to join Overwatch’s ranks later on. But July’s recruit, the first legal addition to Overwatch was the steely Vishkar architech from the hearing whose orders were undoubtedly to keep an eye on Lúcio. Helix would have to wait. So would the United States, whom had seemed very intent on getting McCree off their roster and into a cell, his seniority status in Overwatch be damned.

Reinhardt, Torbjörn, Genji, Zenyatta, and he were each forwarded a long attachment to be signed from Athena. She told them that the sooner they read through everything, agreed, and signed, the sooner their team members would be allowed to return from America.

“Allowed?” Torbjörn raised an eyebrow with a stylus pen in between his teeth.

“We are walking on very thin ice, Agent Torbjörn.” Athena said with all the gravity she could muster. “Even I have been given parameters to work under. Or over, as they underestimate my capabilities. But this is, as you say, off the record.” Her logo flashed with her amusement. Genji laughed, but it was strained.

At the end of the week, the transport hovered down over the landing dock on a cloudy afternoon. There was a storm rolling in. The wind buffeted the gulls overhead, and whipped his scarf over his eyes as he and the others walked out of a side room by the tower to greet them. He missed the moment the doors to the transport opened, revealing their exhausted, but otherwise fine, teammates.

Winston was the first one out, who was greeted warmly by Athena. He was followed by a tall, dark woman in an impeccable white suit, modified on the left side to accommodate her prosthetic. Her long hair was pinned in a braided bun, blue hard light earrings hung from her ears. Her eyes, which Hanzo could see from a distance were a striking golden color, looked over what she could see of Watchpoint Gibraltar assessing. Mei came after her, talking about something, but she was too far for Hanzo to hear clearly over the wind. The architech tugged a small white suitcase at her heels. Reinhardt quickly walked over and offered to take it for her with a big welcome and a bigger smile. She shook her head slightly, and seemed to thank him for the offer. Reinhardt, looking completely untroubled, fell into step besides her and Mei and led them into the Watchpoint.

Angela had her nose stuck in her tablet, her glasses threatening to slide right off her face. She called out a general greeting and made a beeline for her medbay. Lúcio waited until the architech was well away before making his appearance, McCree followed after. They were waved over by Torbjörn, who stood behind Hanzo and Genji, checking over one of his turrets.

Lena, their pilot, came last. She closed the doors with the press of a button and blinked over to Genji. She fell onto him in an exhausted hug, which he returned, amused.

“Genji-kun! You should’ve been there! Bunch of tossers, talking like they knew what for! _We have no conclusive evidence that Talon was behind any of these incidents._ ” She bitterly mocked the UK representative’s dismissal of Overwatch’s worries. “What’re they playing at?”

“Minister for Magic.” Lúcio said flatly as he stalked past. Lena giggled and went boneless in Genji’s arms.

“Blimey, I’m knackered. Who’s on dinner duty tonight?” Speaking a mile a minute, not sounding tired in the least.

“My brother.” Genji responded and gave her back a sympathetic pat.

“Hanzo can cook?” McCree called out in mock-surprise from behind them. Genji made an affronted noise. He turned, carrying Lena with his motion.

“Of course he can! Who did you think taught me?”

A real tone of surprise colored the cowboy’s voice. “Uh, school?”

Genji scoffed. “As if I ever paid attention in class.”

Cooking dinner for two old men (no matter how big their appetites) and himself had been no trouble. Genji and Zenyatta didn’t eat, but Genji liked to help anyway. But cooking for the newly returned team was a daunting task. To add to the already large group, the architech ate as well, no matter how stiff and robotic she behaved.

“That’s something, coming from you.” Genji remarked when Hanzo said as much. “Don’t worry. I will not hold it against you that you did not help me on my turns. I’ll come by the kitchen later.”

He shouldn’t have bothered with the architech. She did not show up to the communal dinner. Instead, the team collectively whooped in welcome when he joined them for the first time that night. He sat besides Mei, who upon hearing it had been his turn to cook, had saved him a seat. He willed himself not to react in his embarrassment. He was saved from having to speak when Genji sat next to him, but without a plate in front of him. He had brought his master along.

“This is the most delightful spread.” said the omnic, as if he had any idea what made for good food. Genji rushed into explanation, pointed at each dish on the trays, and then dared the entire room to try eating with chopsticks. McCree complained loudly from two tables away when his _gyoza_ made another bid for the ground.

They were all called into the cafeteria the next morning before team training. Winston sat in his spot at the front of the room. Standing next to him was the architech, who Hanzo momentarily realized still hadn’t introduced herself.

“I am Satya Vaswani, to those of you I did not get the chance to greet yesterday.” She said when all agents had groggily settled in with their breakfasts. “Call sign: Symmetra. Officially, I am to act as liaison between Overwatch and the Vishkar Corporation. While I still have ties with Vishkar, be assured that I am here to uphold your cause. We hope that together, we can assure that no further disorder befalls the planet. The Vishkar Corporation has the solution, the right solution, to every problem. With our resources and talents pooled together, the new Overwatch will be a formidable force against those agents of terror.”

“Thank you, Ms. Vaswani.” Winston said, and she nodded gracefully down at him. The speech had sounded well-rehearsed to Hanzo’s ears. She looked relieved to be able to sit down. “Now, to business.” Winston pulled out his glasses and set them carefully on his nose. “We have a mission.”

The United Nations’ first mission assignment to Overwatch was to guard the delivery of the very same gauntlet that Winston and Lena had saved months before. Transportation from Europe down to Africa had been taken care of, but the law enforcement in Ghana expressed concern over terrorist threats floating around Numbani’s Unity Day Festival. In response, the United Nations would send their own peacekeepers to protect the gauntlet until it reached Numbani’s borders. From there, it would be Overwatch’s job to chaperone the same thing they had broken the Petras Act to protect until it could be handed over to the Heritage Museum.

Agents Mercy, Mei, Reinhardt, Tracer, Genji, and Symmetra were assigned to the mission.

“Bet you anything we’re not on there ‘cause they think we’re crooked.” Lúcio stage-whispered to McCree. McCree snorted, but didn’t offer anything in response.

When team practice was over, Hanzo didn’t join the rest in the locker rooms. Instead, he headed over to Range One. He had Athena set up for target practice. As he stepped up to a firing point, he heard the sound of spurs stepping into the smaller range.

“What do you want, cowboy?” He called out after his first arrow had found its mark.

“I said I’d see you at team practice, but in between the, y’know, practice, there wasn’t much time to talk.” McCree stepped into the stand next to his. He plopped a box of ammo on the little shelf hanging off the low partitions between stands on his side. “So I’m here to talk.”

Hanzo didn’t find the need to answer. The man would continue his mindless jabber whether he had another half to the conversation or not, as was his custom. He eyed Peacekeeper just as McCree spun the chamber shut, and reached up to the ear muffs hanging at the panel over his head.

They practiced and McCree talked, yelling to be heard over the loud bangs of his shots. He knew Hanzo wasn’t listening, too. He probably vainly enjoyed the sound of his own voice. It was a nice voice, despite being flagrantly overused. Hanzo was not one to judge too harshly.

In a stall where Hanzo had to have his arrows retrieved and McCree had to reload his gun, he took the opportunity to hound Hanzo and be heard.

“Did you and Genji talk things out?” he asked. Hanzo grunted. He tugged his ear muffs off and hung them around his neck. He told him that there hadn’t been anything to talk out.

“We are fine.” He assured him, well aware McCree considered Genji to be a good friend. McCree smiled and slid a bullet into an empty chamber.

“Oh, well good. It’s mighty awkward when a fella’s friends can’t stand to look at each other.”

Hanzo hummed absently in agreement. Then he processed his words. “What?”

“Well, yeah. It’d be weird to have to tiptoe around you two again. It took a long while to get past that. To get here, I mean. Here as in friends. Friends who don’t shoot each other on principle.” Loaded, he clicked the safety back off and made a headshot, then fanned the hammer into the body of a dummy. He glanced over at Hanzo.

At Hanzo’s obvious, wide-eyed confoundment, McCree backtracked on his words and reiterated somewhat nervously. “As in, Genji n’ me. We’re friends. You n’ me. Friends. I mean, if you’re amenable.”

“We’re… what?” He let his initial shock morph into confusion. Of all the things he had expected to come running out of the gunslinger’s mouth, that hadn’t even made the list.

That McCree considered him a friend, despite their initial (and still common) arguments bewildered Hanzo. He wasn’t polite to him, wasn’t considerate, or even very nice. And Hanzo didn’t intend to start. Besides, Hanzo didn’t make friends. Mei was friendly, but she was that way with everyone. She had been friendly from the start, and so her friendship was easy to accept. But there stood a man who had hated him as intensely as Hanzo hated himself. And he claimed they were friends.

In his childhood, there had been playmates, chosen by his father. In his adolescence, there had been family retainers and people interested in Hanzo solely for his family name. In all his life, he never had Genji's social grace. He had only had Genji.

Foolishness was in the air again. Foolishness was in the firing stand next to his.

McCree was looking over at him with increasing concern, worried if his little confession had upset or angered him. The fact that his concern touched Hanzo was not something the cowboy needed to know. He quickly tried to find a way to distract the man from how much his words had affected him.

An idea struck. “Fu..rendu...su?” He pronounced slowly, carefully. Exaggerating.

“Uh huh?” McCree said hesitantly. He lowered his gun and let it rest off to his side.

“Friends?” He repeated, this time clearer. “What is that?”

“Friends? _Amigos_? Uh, come on, Shimada-san, I know you know English.”

“It is a second language. I am not completely fluent.” He lied gracefully. His face remained completely serious as he went on. “It is insensitive of you to assume I have mastered every word in your ridiculous language. I thought you boasted of being a gentleman. Gentlemen are polite.”

“Well, shit. I’m sorry.” He stammered, sincere. “I should know better, _hay veces_ that somethin’ trips me up too. Look, lemme go back and grab my handheld. It’s got a language app. Or, uh, I’m sure Miss Athena wouldn’t mind if I asked her to run a quick translation for me.” [3]

Hanzo was only a human being. His frown slipped. McCree began to look up to address the AI and then did a double take. Hanzo forced down the smirk and looked up as well, expectantly.

But McCree didn’t call Athena. He narrowed his eyes as he considered Hanzo. “Are you… are you screwin’ with me?”

This time, Hanzo truly didn’t understand. “Screwing?” He thought of Torbjörn’s projects and the tools littered around his shop. His face felt as if it were worthy of a clipart image of confusion. “No?”

“Messin’ with me, then.” He pressed. Hanzo heard the click of Peacekeeper’s safety being turned on, and suddenly McCree was leaning on the partition, invading Hanzo’s space.

“No to that as well.” He tilted away from the gunslinger. That close, he could smell the tobacco lingering on his breath. Vile.

“Naw, you gotta be. You’re fuckin’ with me. You’re joking. You’re actually joking!” Gleeful and pleasantly surprised. “Well slap me silly, I didn’t think you had it in ya!”

English idioms. Hanzo smirked, and raised his gloved hand to do just that. McCree squawked and cowered back before his hand could make contact. He awkwardly aimed Peacekeeper at the ground when he raised both hands to protect himself. “It’s just a sayin’! Don’t actually do it!”

“Sayings should have some meaning attached to them. What is the meaning of that one?”

“Slap me silly? It jus’ means I…” McCree relaxed and set his gun down carefully. “I must be goin’...” He exhaled and looked down at him with a curious expression. “...Crazy. Every time, Shimada-san. Every time you talk, I know less and less what to think of you.”

“Interesting. Every time you speak, I long for the peace of quiet.”

“It’s ‘peace and quiet’.” McCree supplied helpfully. Hanzo’s face scrunched up again, parsing the phrase mentally.

“What I said makes perfect sense.” He defended.

“Yeah, but it ain’t how people actually talk.” McCree raised an eyebrow, thoroughly enjoying himself.

“Hm.” Hanzo didn’t give him the satisfaction of continuing their banter. He turned back to the targets and shot the cutout’s neck.

McCree went back to his line as well. Hanzo tugged the protective ear muffs on. Their scores tallied on the screen to their right. Hanzo glanced up and saw that while his was steadily increasing, McCree’s was rising and falling sporadically. He looked at McCree’s targets, and found bullet holes pelted on three of them in a nonsense pattern. _Eh? Chigau._ It was a word.  [4]

‘H E Y’. Each letter blown into one of three targets. He looked over their partition and saw a nearly empty box on McCree’s short shelf. What a waste of ammo.

He knew there would be a ridiculous grin on the cowboy’s face once he lifted his gaze to look at him. He swept one ear muff off and checked anyway. He got the grin, but the wink was unexpected.

Hanzo frowned. He reached back to his quiver and pulled three arrows. They landed in an evenly spaced horizontal line across the chest of his next target. McCree laughed next to him. The sound was deep, rumbling, and very warm. The sound of peace. Hanzo didn’t linger on that thought.

Six gunshots rang out before Hanzo could re-adjust his hearing protection. Ears ringing from the proximity, he took the seconds McCree took to reload to do so. The last target on McCree’s line sported a slightly curving line along the bottom of an inner ring, and one at the red center of the chest. After the reload, the curve was evened out, and two shots made their way over the bullseye. Peacekeeper was smoking slightly. A smiling face.

Without making the mistake of taking off the muffs again, Hanzo threw out a casual, “The smile is crooked.”  

Through the muffs, and watching McCree’s lips closely, he knew the cowboy had responded with a chuckled, “Damn critic.”

He loaded Peacekeeper one last time and holstered it. Then he bent down to clean up his firing point. Hanzo waited for Athena to have his arrows retrieved, and watched McCree listlessly. The door to the ranges swooshed open.

“Jesse?” Angela Ziegler’s voice was preceded by the clicking of her heels. Hanzo looked away from McCree to see her reach them and stand with her arms around her middle, chewing at her bottom lip.

“What can I do for ya?” McCree threw over his shoulder while picking up his bullet shells.

“You need to come see this.” Her voice dripped concern. McCree caught it like a hound on a scent.

“What’s wrong, Angie?”

She shook her head, put a finger over her mouth in a shushing motion, and made for the door.

“Alright.” McCree warily stood up and wiped his hands on his jeans. He looked over at him and nodded at the doctor, who was walking away briskly. “Y’comin’?”

He followed.

When the gathered party of Winston, Lena, Angela, Zenyatta, Genji, and Lúcio turned to see Hanzo following McCree as they entered the lab, (not the briefing room, Hanzo noted) the former half shot an inquisitive look at the gunslinger. McCree shrugged. No one said anything. Angela pulled her tablet towards her at her seat by Winston’s worktable. Lúcio waved them over. McCree and Hanzo took the offered seats next to him.

“I’m sorry to gather you all like this, but I’m afraid this is urgent. Fareeha Amari gave me a message during the meeting in New York. I’ve just had the chance to look at it now.” She pointed to the data chip inserted in her tablet. “She says that she intercepted a message that went through one of Helix’s secondary servers. Helix has reason to believe there’s someone on the inside leaking security intel. Given what just transpired with the Anubis A.I. they had under their protection, they’ve upped surveillance on all transmissions. She came upon this on accident, and hasn’t let any of her superiors know. She’s afraid the breach that allowed Anubis to attack their firewalls may go deeper than they initially figured.”

“There was strange coding attached to the script of a schedule listing guard rotations for a delegation in Numbani scheduled on Unity Day. At first, she thought it was just the computers acting up. The code itself wasn’t interfering with the layout, but she thought it looked suspiciously like… well.”

She handed her tablet over to McCree. He looked down at what Hanzo was close enough to see looked like a random string of numbers and letters spit out of a coding program gone wrong. Hanzo watched McCree’s expression cloud over.

“This is a Blackwatch cipher.” He muttered grimly.

Mercy closed her eyes. She winced. “I’m sorry, Jesse.”

“What does this mean?” Lena asked, worried.

“It means that I’m afraid the world is in need of us once again.” Angela said. Then she turned to McCree, who was still looking down at the tablet, face screwed up in concentration. “Can you decode that?”

“Workin’ on it, darlin’.” After a few long minutes, he made a frustrated sound. “I can’t work like this anymore. Too outta practice. Someone gimme a calculator. And a pen and paper.”

Hanzo stood up and walked away. Winston pointed at the tablet. “That has a calculator and a drawing app.”

“Nah, can’t do it like that. I hafta be looking at it to figure it out.” Hanzo returned with the requested materials and dropped them on the table in front of him. “Oh. Thanks, sweetie.”

He growled his annoyance, but McCree paid him no mind. He was already scrawling lightning-quick on the yellow notepad he had fetched for him.

“This delegation,” Genji asked, “What’s it for?”

“Activists and omnic rights advocates, as well as politicians from Numbani are gathering for a conference on Unity Day to discuss procedures for omnic refugees fleeing Scandinavian and former Union countries as the situation in Siberia escalates. Many countries, including Great Britain, have barred their borders to innocent omnics, and tensions are rising. Numbani, and other sympathetic countries are coming together to see what they could provide in terms of aid and shelter.”

“As such, Fareeha admits that she suspects that the anonymous threats to the festival were really directed at this delegation. Rumor has it there is a group of radical omnics, former followers of Mondatta’s, who are looking to disrupt the festival with some sort of demonstration.” Angela finished, and took a deep breath. 

“But his followers were peaceful!” Lena put in.

“Many were peaceful because his teachings were so. With him gone, it is to be expected that his students stray from his teachings. Talon has turned my brother Mondatta into a martyr. History shows that people are always too willing to die for a martyr.” Zenyatta intoned sadly. Genji made an angry noise.

“Tekhartha Mondatta was a figurehead for omnic peace. His assassination has led to a small series of protests bordering on riots. There is unrest in the omnic community, and with what’s happening in Russia, the world fears a second uprising.” Winston added.

“In hopes of instigating a full-blown revolt, Fareeha believes Talon is planning another attack similar to that of King’s Row.”

“Where? On who?” Lúcio asked.

“The message was attached to security detail on the conference. Given their stance of peace and the percentage of omnics that make up its population, they make a prime target for a terrorist strike by Talon. We're thinking assassination. Winston has triangulated the satellites in hope of finding the signal used to create the message that Fareeha intercepted.”

“Shit.”

McCree had stopped scribbling. Hanzo leaned slightly closer to look at what was written on the paper.

“Shit. Shit.” He looked up. “It’s another assassination plot, alright.” He paused to let it sink in. Those gathered hung off his every word. “But this time it ain’t a fancy lil’ sniper doing the work. This here says they’ve planted their own omnics. Working in City Hall, of all our shit luck.”

“An assassination done by a mystery sniper is a tragedy. Murder committed by omnics will throw the world into war again. Damn!” Angela cursed, but rallied quickly. “We need to take this to the UN offices in Geneva. We will be in Numbani to guard Doomfist’s gauntlet. We can send the rest of our agents to City Hall to intercept the assassination attempt.”

“Angie, you heard them when we were there. They don’t wanna hear it! They don’t wanna believe Talon exists! At best, they’ll believe us and send their own troops, who’ll fuck it all up and we’ll still have a bunch of dead delegates and a second uprising!” McCree let his voice rise, white hot anger coloring his words.

“And at worst, they’ll cancel our mission because they won’t trust us not to try to intervene. Morrison and Reyes didn’t exactly leave us with the cleanest track record, Angela. Jesse’s right.” said Winston.

“Unity Day is a week from now, right?” Lúcio asked suddenly. Hanzo opened his mouth to answer, remembering the morning briefing, but was beaten to it.

“Yes, it was set back to buff up security. Why?” Winston looked at him curiously.

Inexplicably, Lúcio was grinning. “Because, if you need another way into Numbani, then I’m your man. I’ve got a big concert scheduled there for the Festival. Set in stone, man, there ain’t nothing the UN can say about it! I can get the rest of us in on the down-low.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I was a student teacher, I had a mom go off on me for daring to have her kid help the class pick up a bunch of soggy paper cups, so McCree was channeling my frustration.
> 
> [1]The bros convo goes like this:  
> Gen: What’re you doing/ whatcha doin’?  
> Han: Thinking  
> Gen: What are you thinking about?  
> Han: Nothing, really  
> *Insert whiny Genji saying “Hanzo”*  
> Han: (I'm thinking about) my annoying little brother.  
> [2]What strikes me here is people’s friendliness  
> [3]There’s times  
> [4]No, wrong


	8. Time Moves As It Stands Still

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The plan is to fan this spark into a flame but damn it’s gettin dark so lemme post this before i get even more distracted heyyyyy 
> 
> [WhiteNoize33666](http://archiveofourown.org/users/WhiteNoize33666/pseuds/WhiteNoize33666) deserves all the nice things.
> 
> See end notes for translations, hover over japanese for the kanji/hangul if ur on pc.

Dr. Ziegler was quick to shoot down Lúcio’s offer, claiming it too risky. Advertisements for his concert had been out for months, and his induction into Overwatch had trended worldwide. They were walking on eggshells with the UN as it was. If they were caught, they would be taken in as criminal vigilantes. “And Ms. Vaswani would be sure to notice your absence.” she made sure to add.

“So I’ll call it in and tell ‘em to pick us up after Lena’s taken off! Bringing in your own security is standard practice in the industry! Solo and my boy Mac here ain’t on the Doomfist op. I can get them in some suits, lookin’ real nice. I’ma have to book it once the concert’s over, anyway. Got a publicity thing in Paris the next day. It’ll be quick, in and out!” He accentuated by bringing his arm up and parting his thumb and pinky from his middle three digits. He flew his hand over his head, copying the sound of a jet taking off. “ _Pchew!_ Come on, let me do this!”

Genji snorted. McCree let out an amused chuff despite his temper. The doctor rubbed at her temples.

“What did you call me?” Hanzo growled. McCree made a calming gesture with his metal hand.

“It ain’t nothin’ bad darlin’. And Lúcio, it’s a nice thought, but we’d have no support goin’ in. You’ll be at your gig!” McCree pointed out.

“I could provide support.” Zenyatta put in. “Harmony must be retained in Numbani.”

“Thank you, but that will not be necessary. We are not- ”

“Angie, look at this crap!” McCree waved the tablet at her. “This is Blackwatch! Blackwatch playbook in a fuckin’ terrorist plot! If Talon has the know-how to use this, then what else do they know? How far is their reach? This is something _we_ deal with! Us! No one else!”

“This feels an awful lot like being compromised, Mercy. Not even a week in.” Lena buried her face in her hands and groaned.

“I know what this looks like, but we cannot waste time thinking on the past! The explosion at the headquarters may not be connected. We cannot let this go to our heads.” The doctor’s words earned her a disbelieving glare from her friend. McCree looked angrier than Hanzo had ever seen him. Dr. Ziegler could not bring herself to meet his gaze.

“If I may,” Athena interrupted their dispute, “I have run the scenarios. Agent Mercy, Lúcio’s offer is sound. His concert overlaps with the conference. The UN would have no reason to put him under suspicion. If Agents McCree, Hanzo, and Zenyatta run a stealth op, identify and take out the omnics in question before it ends, they would be able to leave with Lúcio’s press team.”

“Like I said, in and out.” Lúcio repeated, glad to have someone on his side.

“There’s still a matter of security.” Athena continued. “The terrorist threat has City Hall monitored heavily, and it is too late in their preparations to be able to hack in and input our agents as guests or staff without alerting Helix, and by extension, the UN.”

“We’ll figure it out and cover for you with Satya.” Winston shrugged. “Easy enough. I have a few projects I’ve been meaning to ask her to look at. It shouldn’t be too hard to keep her busy until you both come back. Just don’t come back with any injuries that can’t be blamed on the training bots.”

“If we’re doing this,” Mercy sighed and swept her bangs away from her face, “Then I will be long gone with the Doomfist team and unable to reach you. I have no doubt of Zenyatta’s abilities, but…”

“But I am no doctor.” Zenyatta nodded at her reassuringly. “Rest assured, Dr. Ziegler, we will not take any undue risks. I will do my part to keep us safe and whole.”

“Thank you, Zenyatta. But as I said, I do not doubt you.” She turned her gaze on McCree, who handed back her tablet. He looked at her with wide eyes, feigning innocence. “Jesse, I know covert is your specialty, but I won’t be there. Don’t get anything worse than shot. And do try not to get shot.” It was said in jest, but there was real concerned sketched on her face.

“Wouldn’t dream of disobeyin’ my doctor’s orders.”

“Yet you will not stop smoking.” She did not look convinced. She looked to Winston, and he launched into conjecture about how this stealth mission would pan out. Athena pulled up maps of the city and the area surrounding city hall and Lúcio’s venue in Unity Plaza.

Hours were spent smoothing out details, giving them entry and exit strategies. Winston polished his glasses delicately with a cloth as he spoke. “We will need Fareeha’s cooperation to figure out who the assassins are. She has access to Helix’s security intel and the guest list. Athena needs to identify possible suspects.”

“I will speak with her.” Dr. Ziegler assured.

No more arguments broke out. Winston called their meeting to an end, ordering those gathered not to breathe a word to anyone and promising to pass along any news from their contact in Helix. Lúcio took Winston’s vacated seat at the tire and began making calls. The doctor left the room, and with her went Genji and Zenyatta. Lena hung around Winston, trying to lighten his mood.

“Silver linings, big guy! Helix’ll have to adhere to Numbani’s crazy right to privacy laws! That means no dodging cameras! It’s like Christmas for blokes like Jesse, you’ll see!” Lena said as they both disappeared into a side room.

There was a telltale click of a lighter, followed a few seconds later by a lightly whistled exhale baring the scent of smoke. Hanzo turned his head and got a noseful of it. The cowboy’s hat was tipped forward, the shadow of it hiding much of his face. The warm glow of the embers at the end of his cigarillo showed a grimace twisting his mouth. Wherever the lull in conversation had taken McCree, it had not been to memories of happier times. Were they in a bar, he would fit the part of the wanted outlaw, a ranger no one dared to cross. A hired gun, a hired sword. A wandering _rōnin_ from a different age and place.

The intensity of his stare distracted him, and McCree looked up to meet his gaze dubiously.

“What?” he asked. If he took the next second to fondle his gun, prop his booted feet up on the table, and spit on the floor, the scene would be complete.

“Hm.” Hanzo answered, still mentally entertaining the western playing in his mind’s eye.

“What?!” McCree uncrossed his arms and tipped his hat back away from his eyes

Unwilling to speak of the foolishness that he had just been entertaining, Hanzo settled on a neutral and disinterested tone. “There is something else on your mind. Besides, or perhaps related to, the assassination plot. Something that stilled your tongue. What is it?” He considered tacking on a warning to McCree that Winston would not appreciate him clogging the breathable air in his lab with his acrid smoke, but he decided to leave the scolding to the one slighted.

“I don’t like this.” McCree was chewing at the end of his cigarillo, concern written stark all over his features. He leaned forward and spread his hands over the tabletop. Hanzo watched as the metal one snagged on the fibrous material of a prototype for Mei’s suit. “Any of this, especially ‘cause this is the kinda cards-under-the-table shit that got us into trouble in the first place. I mean, I don’t much care either way, Blackwatch was _encubierto_ from the start. But Overwatch shouldn’t have to resort to this so soon.”[1]

“Blackwatch?” Hanzo hoped for an explanation.

McCree didn’t deliver. “Yeah. This is the second time I’ve seen Talon use old Blackwatch methods. It ain’t gonna lead nowhere good, I can tell ya that.”

“There is nothing about this situation to be liked.” Hanzo allowed. They lapsed back into silence. Winston and Lena came back and McCree got the reprimand Hanzo had predicted. Hanzo calmly followed him out the door when Winston threatened to bodily throw McCree into the hall.

The silence resumed in the hallway. He thought of what to pack for the mission next week, how he would hide his gear so that none of Lúcio’s people grew suspicious. He tried to recall his past visit to Numbani and recalled only a dull sense of unease. Numbani and danger it posed should another God Program be unleashed set him on anxious alert. Japan had fared better than their neighboring South Korea and China during the Crisis, but even protected as they had been in their childhood, Hanzo still remembered days huddled in the bomb shelter of their castle. Genji had always been inconsolable, their father often not present, and their mother desperate to ease her sons’ frayed nerves while she had been alive to do so. Their mother--

“I didn’t take you to be the type to woolgather, Shimada-san.” McCree said, startling him out of his reverie. He looked up and saw that they were fast approaching the living area of the base. The sounds of the recreation room carried towards them. “Penny for your thoughts?”

English idioms. What was a penny and what would it do for his thoughts? “What?”

“What’s on your mind, darlin’?” McCree said, tone suggesting he was repeating himself. “To what do ya owe that stinkface?”

“Stinkface?”

“Well, I reckon that might just be your face.” McCree shrugged, careless. “Still, what’s wrong?”

Hanzo chose to ignore the comment on his face. He buried thoughts of his mother and answered, “My wanderings took me to that place.” At McCree’s confused expression, he clarified. “Numbani.”

“Ah. And?”

“It was not to my liking.”

“Well honey, you are a tough man to please.”

Sweetie, honey, darling. Would the man settle on what degrading thing to call him? He made his displeasure known. “Do not call me that.”

“What?”

“Sweetie, honey, darling. I would have them all cease.” They reached the door to the recreation room and Hanzo stopped to allow McCree to go through first before they bumped together trying to squeeze through at the same time. “I am none of those things. They are all obnoxious.”

McCree looked taken aback, as if he hadn’t realized he had been using pet names. He huffed. “It’s a habit. Cultural differences! Can’t very much help it, darlin’. Besides,” A sly smile slotted into place on his tanned face, “Why would I stop? When I’m lucky, why, I swear I can see a hint o’ color on your face.”

“Any blood rushing to my face following your tactless words are born solely out of indignation, I assure you.” He slid the door shut behind them.

“Right.” McCree steered them towards the couch, where Mei and Vaswani were seated watching the news. “What should I call you then?”

“I have a name.”

“Nah, I ain’t commitin’ a Japanese _faux pas_ . Genji-kun wasn’t Genji-kun until way in the game. And he’s only Genji when I forget. Afternoon, ladies.” He tipped his hat in greeting to the two that had turned to see who had entered. Mei gave them a muffled, “ _Nihao_ McCree, Hanzo. _”_ with a mouthful of orange chips. The architech gave them both a cool nod. Hanzo pointedly gestured at Mei to indicate what she had just called him. McCree chose to ignore it.   

“MEKA’s initiative to recruit online gamers as pilots to their drone units has proven very effective, hasn’t it, Richard?” The newswoman on the television was saying.

“That it has, Jana, that it has!” The camera swung to center on a man standing in front of a screen streaming footage from a fight with renegade omnics trickling in from South Korea’s northern border. “If you missed the stream last night, here’s a clip of MEKA soldier and internet sensation D.Va taking on a group of Bastion units!”  

_“Geim-eul hamyeon igyeoyaji!”_ yelled a girl’s voice in a playful taunt. [2] Two pink gloved hands could be seen just off the corners of the screen, holding matching pink blaster controls. The blue focus on her mecha onscreen honed in on a rogue omnic lumbering towards her, which was destroyed by a beam of her cannon. An angry bunny insignia lit up the bottom center of her screen, and a comment feed scrolled too quick to read at the top corner right.

The girl laughed. She made a kissing sound and the camera flipped to capture her face. She was very young. Hanzo blinked in surprise and paid more attention. She had shoulder length brown hair and bangs that framed a round and youthful face. Pink whiskers were painted on her cheeks. _"Gam sa!”_ [3] Her grin was wide and all too viciously pleased. She winked at the camera and continued in lilting English, “D.Va one, bad guys zero! Wow, you guys have been as busy as I have! Don’t forget, like, subscribe, tell your friends! Donate link’s on the bottom! You know the drill! I’m here all night!”

“Cute as a button.” McCree said as the show went back to the hijabi newswoman. Hanzo turned to see his own surprise mirrored on the taller man’s face. “Dang if she don’t make me feel inferior.”

“Her site says she’s eighteen.” Mei said, busily swiping at the screen of her phone. “Only been a part of MEKA for about half a year. She’s… wow. Oh, wow. I need to follow her. Oh! She was in Hero of My Storm! I knew she looked familiar!”    

Dr. Ziegler approached from behind, toting her ever-present tablet. “You were younger, Jesse. Don’t let her wound your pride.” she said playfully, not looking up from the humming blue screen in her hand.

“Yeah, but all I had’s this peashooter.” McCree rounded on the doctor and gestured to the gun in the holster at his hip with both hands in a quick downward swoop. “She’s got a mech!”

“And you’ve got a prosthetic overdue for a checkup.” She paused, looked up, and watched the pair sitting on the couch. Neither of them paid her much mind. Mei had already cast a wave over the back of the couch to their new arrival. “I need this done within the week, Jesse. I can’t guarantee I’ll have time after we run the Doomfist op.”

“So in other words, ‘follow me to the medbay if you know what’s good for you’?”

“And you once said we don’t speak each other’s language.” She grinned and swept back out of the room.

* * *

 

The week leading up to the Doomfist mission had all hands on deck. Those that weren’t listed on the UN’s roster for the mission had to pick up a heavier workload. McCree, Hanzo, and Zenyatta had to find their own time to prepare, but Winston made sure they always got lighter chores to keep up pretenses. Hanzo got stuck helping Torbjörn run inventory in the early morning.

When the chore was complete, he made his way out through the huge sliding doors of the loading bay to watch as the team prepared for their departure. The doctor was already in her suit and quadruple checking the insides of her aid kits. Genji was sunbathing atop one of the wings of the transport. Vaswani and Mei were standing off to the side, the latter apparently holding a one-sided conversation. Reinhardt was with Winston, going over worst-case scenarios in case of Talon interference.

Hanzo noticed their pilot was nowhere to be seen.

The sound of loud music full of strumming guitars and accordions made him turn to see where the base opened to allow for a dirt road leading further up the cliffs. Pushed to the side was a red truck, wheels tilted down to rest on the ground. It was an older model, the frame looked ill-fit to the modifications done to its lower half to allow for the hover technology.

Torbjörn had refused to deal with the few dusty automobiles that Overwatch had left behind in the base. Winston had no use for them, so he had left them fall to disuse and disrepair. But now that there were so many of them, they would need means of everyday transportation. Reinhardt said someone named Brigitte would be coming back to take his van, so facing the reality that their grocery vehicle was spoken for, the team had made fixing the cars a priority that couldn’t wait.

McCree had apparently taken up the job when no one else did. He was half-hidden under the body of the truck, metal arm outstretched and beckoning. Zenyatta floated out from behind the truck and reached down to hand him some cylindrical tool. Curious, Hanzo made his way towards them. Behind him, he felt his brother stand and jump down from his resting place to follow him towards his master and their mutual friend. Genji made it there faster, his silent feet quick to win an unspoken race. Hanzo didn’t pick up his pace and settled to watch instead.

“Almost done, McCree?” Genji fell to sit on his haunches and poked the cowboy on his outer thigh. McCree jerked violently. There was a loud _bang_ followed by quick cursing in Spanish.

“Fuckin’ told you not to pull tha’ ninja shit on me, Genji-kun, _chingado_!” McCree emerged from beneath the truck, sitting up and rubbing lightly at his forehead. “Zenyatta, warn a guy, would you?” [4]

“My apologies.”

“That hardly counts as ninja shit.” Genji countered. Hanzo finally reached them, eyeing the project with interest, and the music blasting from the truck’s stereo with distaste. McCree lit up when he approached and jerked his chin towards Genji as if expecting Hanzo to scold his brother for the misuse of his training.

“I did not know you knew mechanics.” Hanzo said mildly, ignoring the look. The man had grease stains smudged up his arms, darkening the edges of his rolled-up sleeves. His hat was gone, and his hair was pulled back into a short ponytail, blonde hair pins holding his bangs away from his eyes. A raised bump graced his forehead, courtesy of Genji’s ‘ninja shit’.

“Picked up a few things here and there.” He answered, still casting Genji resentful looks. “Gotta work on the arm, sometimes. This’s good practice. This model’s a little older than I’m used to but my- ” he cut himself off, face flashing a regretful look, and he shook his head. “I figured it out. Zenyatta helped.”

“My aid was entirely passive.”

“A listenin’ ear always helps.” McCree grinned up at Zenyatta, then faltered and rubbed at the back of his neck, staining his collar black, “Or, uh… a listenin’ sound receptor.”

“Older?” Genji asked, looking from man to machine.

“This dinosaur still uses gasoline.” McCree leaned back against the side of it and patted it gently. “Hybrid, but still,” he snorted, “Gasoline. C’mere, look at the engine.” He stood and led them towards the front to pull up the hood. “Weirdest damn thing. The computer’s so small, just the microprocessors and the GPS system and the dash controls.”

He explained with wide hand gestures that Hanzo had to dodge to avoid getting hit by, talking animatedly about pistons and crankshafts, valves and cylinders. Using jargon and terms that went past what Hanzo knew in English, and quite possibly their Japanese translations.

Zenyatta watched attentively even if it was obvious that he had been given this exact spiel before. Genji nodded and made the appropriate inquisitive noises whenever McCree stopped to draw breath, but he kept throwing glances at Hanzo, who was listening in rapt attention. He didn’t even know how to change out a hover tire.

Genji distracted him from his examination. _“Ne, Hanzo. Makkurī wa kashikoi, ne?”_ [5]

Clever? McCree? Certainly, whenever he stopped talking nonsense long enough to say anything worthwhile. Hanzo knew his range scores well enough to know McCree was more than brawn, and their team exercises showed he would be an asset in battle. Hanzo was even looking forward to their mission that day in order to see how he fared in action. He had come to notice that a lot of McCree’s prowess was largely owed to luck and quick thinking. He was foolish to rely on such things to keep himself and his teammates alive, but it gave him a spontaneity and that could not be easily countered or avoided. The man was very much his image. Loud, but with intent. Full of surprises.

_“Kare wa...iwaba...kashikoi orokamonoda.”_ [6] 

Genji let out a surprised laugh. McCree paused mid-word and turned to watch their exchange with a frown. _“Hora! Homekotoba? Arienai!”_ [7]

He sent a judging look the cowboy’s way and gave a low chuckle. _“Demo, okashī bōshi o torinozokeba kare jishin de kakunin dekiru wa.”_ He was quick to add the slight, and received a playful shove to the shoulder. [8]

_“E, Hanzo, Makkurī o hitomae de karakau no wa bureina ko- ”_ [9]

“Alright, that’s it, I’m puttin’ my foot down!” McCree cut Genji’s reprimand short. “I’m gettin’ real tired of y’all runnin’ yer mouths off and then sniggerin’ ‘bout it behind my back.” McCree pouted. Genji’s face was of course, inscrutable. Hanzo’s face was, of course, no easier to get a read on. It only served to egg the cowboy on. “Or worse, sniggerin’ right in front o’ me. _Pues saben que?_ Three can play at that game!”[10]

“It was not derogatory, McCree.” Zenyatta spoke soothingly, trying to bring McCree down. Hanzo spoke, quick on the heels of his calming words.

“Ah, yes. But you see cowboy, the fun in the game is that two share in the joke. You, however, lack another Spanish speaker.” Hanzo’s grin was sharp. Genji shoved at him again, but his shoulders were shaking with mirth.

Desperate, McCree cast a line to the only other Latino in the Watchpoint. He thumbed for the group line. “Lúcio! You understand Spanish?”

“About as much as you understand Portuguese.” Came his immediate reply, riding on the bass thump of his music. He had been holed in his room preparing for his show most of the night. Hanzo knew because he lived right next to him. “Sorry, man.”  

Hanzo knew he looked smug. Genji currently didn’t have a face, but he looked it too.

“I’ll download a language program if you do!” Jesse offered hopefully. His transmission on the comm was quickly followed by Lena dropping in.

“I took some Spanish in school! Well, it didn’t take, I changed to French. But I still remember some!” Lena’s voice crackled as she spoke, no doubt coming out of one of her blinks.

“You took _Spainish_ in school.” McCree corrected her. She blew a raspberry at him.

“I speak Spanish.” Zenyatta offered helpfully.

“You speak everything.” McCree reminded him flatly.

“Lena, where are you? We need to leave in three.” Angela joined in on the conversation in a worried tone.

“On my way, love.” Lena said just when Lúcio’s voice came back on the comm.

“You got yourself a deal, Austin!” Lúcio’s music still a heavy thrum in the background, “We’re doing this!”

“I ain’t from Texas.” McCree protested, but his own music blasting from the truck at his back betrayed his words.

“Nah?” Lúcio laughed. The noise on his end went down in volume. “Whatchu listenin’ to, Mac? _Narcocorridos?_ You wanna deny that again?”

“Oh no, don’t you treat me like you do Reinhardt! Keep my music outta this!”

“How ‘bout Clint?”

“Keep this up and I’ll start callin’ you Lulu, don’t tempt me- ”

“Woody?” Lúcio spoke over him, voice cheeky.

“You little shit.” McCree laughed.  

“ _Gilipollas!_ ” Lena yelled out, just to prove she could.[11] She came out from a side door on the other side of the transport at a light jog, toting her orange and white duffel. McCree waved a greeting, which she returned before blinking to her awaiting cockpit. Genji bid the three of them a quiet farewell and a quieter good luck before walking off to board the transport.

They watched it take off. _“Gilipollas.”_ McCree repeated. “See? _Spainish_.”

As if Hanzo knew the difference.

* * *

 

An hour after Lena had flown the team off, Lúcio rushed Hanzo, Zenyatta, and McCree to Winston’s lab and gave them each a suit and a pair of sunglasses. Zenyatta, who painted a strange picture walking and in trousers, handed his pair back to Lúcio, who took them distractedly and handed back a bandana whilst trying to wrestle McCree’s hat away from his head.

“I’ve got an image to upkeep, and honestly, we’re gonna try to keep this hush hush from my people too. For all my agent knows, you’re going as bodyguards because you’re concerned about Vishkar showing their ugly faces. Felicia will _not_ ok the hat, Mac!”

“The hat’s part of a packaged deal!” McCree swatted at Lúcio’s hands to protect his head.

“This is a battle you will not win, Agent Lúcio.” Athena said.

“Really.” Winston supported, “We couldn’t even get him to leave it behind for the IJC event.”

“Fine.” Lúcio grumbled. “Van’s coming to take us to the airport, security will make sure no one sees us, I don’t wanna make a scene at the airport. We’re taking the record label’s private jet. No need to sneak our gear, we’re clear.”

The van was large, nondescript, with tinted windows. A smiling woman with skin darker than Lúcio’s greeted them pleasantly. She introduced herself as the infamous Felicia and opened the trunk for them to pile in their bags, then themselves. They bypassed security at the airport, an agreement somehow struck with the influence of fame. From there, it was a five hour flight. The seats on the jet were like that of a bullet train in Japan, a set of four seats turned inwards and facing one another. Lúcio had crowded them into one cubicle and demanded they chat to battle his nerves.

“What’s ‘thank you’? In Portuguese, it’s ‘ _obrigado_ ’.” He bounced a stress toy in the shape of a frog’s head on his knee. As much as he loved his job, some days he just couldn’t shake the _nervosismo._ McCree had curiously asked if _nervosismo_ meant what he thought it meant, and it had led to the two teaching each other words and phrases in their native tongues. Zenyatta, who appeared to be trying to meditate, would add a word in Nepali once in awhile.

_Arigatou._ Hanzo thought, but didn’t voice. As much as he tried to ignore their game, his mind provided translations impulsively.  

_"Gracias_ . What’s ‘butterfly’? _Mariposa._ ” McCree prompted and responded in the same breath.

_Chou chou._

_“Putalī.”_ said Zenyatta.

“ _Borboleta_.” said Lúcio. “How about ‘see you later’?”

“ _Hasta luego_.”

_Ja mata._

Lúcio laughed, “Oh, it sounds alike! _Até logo_.”

“Alright,” McCree took the unlit cigarillo from his lips and used it to point at Lúcio. “What’s ‘bread’?”

“ _Pão_. In spanish?”

“ _Pan_.”

Hanzo looked up quickly in surprise, a move not missed by McCree. “Somethin’ to share, Shimada-san?”

_It must be gairaigo._[12] He hadn’t known. “It’s the same. In Japanese, bread is ‘ _pan’_.”

“Huh. Ain’t that somethin’?”

“You can always join in _Senhor Shimada_!” Lúcio bounced in his seat, excited to have another player. Hanzo didn’t make any promises, but offered quiet translations as seldomly as the omnic.

They touched down in Numbani to the flash of cameras. The undercover three lagged behind so as to not make it into any of the shots. Lúcio’s actual security cleared the way and pushed them forward when the music idol stalled to sign something or offer a fan a hug, a quick kiss on the cheek, or a handshake. Through the noise, the agents were able to receive a call from Winston telling them that the Doomfist team was just about done, and would be heading back after attending an event at the museum in thanks. No Talon interference, they were assured. But a local gang with spectacularly bad logic had tried their luck and put up a decent fight. The only one injured in the scuffle had been Mei.

“A sniper got her in the leg, but Mercy patched her up. She’s already back on her feet.” Winston assured them before they could voice concern.  

Another van, more cameras, a switch of vehicles under the cover of an underground garage. A tour bus bearing Lúcio’s face took them the last stretch of their journey. The doors to the bus opened directly in front of a side entrance to Unity Plaza. Paparazzi didn’t get an opportunity to rush them before they were safely ensconced backstage. Lúcio was running back and forth, greeting people, shaking hands, and doing checks on his soundboard. Felicia motioned for the three to follow her towards the dressing rooms, where she tiredly told them they could change into their actual gear, and that her ward hadn’t fooled her for a second.

“Amad will guide you out another exit, it leads through a tunnel that only service workers use. I’ve made sure it stays empty tonight. You’ll come out of a department store.” She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Please don’t get spotted coming back, Overwatch. The bus leaves at 8 p.m. sharp, local time. Here’s a key fob for the bus,” She took a second to consider all three of them before nodding and pressing the key into Zenyatta’s hand. “It’d be better if you snuck in there before the show ends, which is at 6, not counting encores. Don’t be late. I’ll do what I can to hold off, but I can’t let my superiors get wind of this, or I’m the one that gets the axe. Don’t make me regret watching your damn cartoon specials when I was a kid, or I swear…” She gave them a look, wariness riding on worship, and walked away.

Zenyatta and McCree went for the dressing rooms. Hanzo remained in his suit, but shed the jacket. He did not like the restriction it made to his movements. Storm Bow was cleverly hidden in a briefcase, and his quiver bore the disguise of a document storage tube. Lúcio skated past him and banged on the doors until the two emerged.

“Alright, Woody, Solo, Zenny, you guys ready? Because I’m ready! I’m pumped! We are doing this!” Lúcio jumped in place and pumped the air with his fist, somehow managing to keep his balance despite his neon skates. “My guys’ll sneak you out the backstage doors when I go out. I’ll go back on the comm line at break and once the show ends. I don’t wanna pack house without y’all. Lemme know if I hafta stall with Felicia!”

They exchanged looks, but no one told Lúcio about his apparent transparency or his agent’s all-seeing-eye.

“And you _know_ to send me a message if you need backup! Man, forget what Angela says, the UN can suck it!” He was obviously still bitter about being overlooked for the UN mission earlier. “Whatever, they didn’t need us, they got their fancy gig that ends in an hour. Check it!” He brandished his phone at them, which had Mei’s journal pulled up, a picture showing the team by a glass case showcasing the black gauntlet. “Cute, huh? But if you need me, I mean it, call me in!”

Another young woman tapped Lúcio on the shoulder. “Mr. Santos? You’re on in four minutes.”

“That’s my cue!” He bounced again, nerves either forgotten or hidden by the thrill. He began jogging backwards towards the stage entrance. His accompaniment, a Nigerian singer, was already wooing their adoring fans.

“Helloooooo Numbani! Happy Unity Day! Better late than never, right?” Her voice rang out on the speakers and a wild cheer followed. One particularly loud female voice screamed out a marriage proposal.

“Ha ha ha! Aw, I’m flattered, really! But hey, we all know why you’re here! I know why I’m here, and while I love all of your beautiful faces, it’s got nothing on our front man! ‘Cause, I mean, you’ve seen him, right?”

Her humble words were answered with laughter, a few wolf-whistles, and more cheering.

She let out a bright laugh. “Yeah, I thought so. Let’s bring him out here! Come on, make some noise! Say it with me now, Lúcio! Lúcio! Lúcio!”

“Ok, for real now, I’m out! Go be heroes!” the star said, wide grin plastered on his face as he twisted around to jog around a large speaker and out of sight. A deafening roar of voices shook the ground, coupled with the steady beat of Lúcio’s magic onstage. The woman began to sing, and the roar became the sound of thousands of voices joining in on a ballad about saving the world.

Lúcio’s music pumped through Hanzo’s body in time with his blood, filling him with exuberance and energy. McCree let out a laugh next to him, and Zenyatta chuckled merrily.

“He does know what he is doing, does he not?” said Zenyatta. He had kept the bandana, and his orbs were crammed into a large backpack slung across his back. McCree’s _sarape_ was fully down, hiding both his ammo belt and gun.

They found Amad waiting by a service entrance. A few minutes after walking through a tunnel lit by a red LED strip along the ceiling, they opened a door into a busy retail store. The consumers were equal parts human and omnic. Hanzo frowned, Zenyatta hummed, and McCree took the lead. They blended into the masses effortlessly, the high fashion and eccentric style of the modern city hid their own getup effortlessly. The streets were packed with people heading for the concert, and loitering around the excitement when they couldn’t manage to get in. Their group paused beneath a huge yellow neon sign that read _Axiom_ to gather their bearings. The setting July sun was unforgiving, and for a moment Hanzo envied McCree his hat.

“I think City Hall is that way.” McCree said, pointing down the road opposite to the one Hanzo had been about to suggest.

“I believe that street is the shortest route to our destination.” Zenyatta pointed another way.

“We should ask a local.” McCree said just as Hanzo pulled out his handheld to check the map Athena had loaded onto their case file. “Excuse me there, miss!” He ran down to catch up with an omnic that had just passed them. The shape of her frame was lithe and feminine, and the lights between the links of her joints lit up a gentle green.

“Yes?” She stopped to face her pursuer, head tilted politely in question.

“Don’t mean to bother such a lovely lady as yourself, but I’m afraid my friends an’ I are a little lost. Would you mind pointin’ us towards City Hall?”

She let out a high pitched hum. “Tourists? Here for the festival?” At McCree’s nod, she went on. “City Hall’s a straight shot down Unity Boulevard, but it’s closed down for the peace talks today. You won’t get much other than a selfie out by the pillars before they shoo you away.”

“Aw, you don’t say? Damn, and here my friend was lookin’ forward to seein’ where the magic happens.” He gestured back at Zenyatta, who acted his part of the let down optimist perfectly.

The omnic looked back at Zenyatta, but shook her head. “Sorry.” Then she raised a finger in the air and went on excitedly, “But, word on the street is that there’s going to be a protest by Mondatta’s people. I’d wait until the mayor gets there in his limo and things really get going. You can’t miss it. It’s gold. But be careful, I hope no violence happens, but you can still get hurt.”

“Aw, honey, as long as you’re well out of harm’s way, I’ll be just fine. Thank you kindly for your time.”      

She giggled and gave him a small wave before walking away. McCree ran back to his teammates.

“Did you just flirt with an omnic?” Hanzo asked incredulously.

“What? It’s 2076! All’s fair in love and war, Shimada-san.” McCree winked, unconcerned, and his long legs set a fast pace down the road.

“We must not judge people for whom they seek to find companionship with, Hanzo.” Zenyatta started after McCree, voice serious.

Hanzo tried not to linger on it.

* * *

 

They made it to City Hall and were greeted by the sight of a line of black cars pulling up to drop their prestigious cargo. There were reporters everywhere, and the three rushed into the parlor of a large restaurant to avoid making it into the news. McCree found a stairwell leading up to a wide bridge between two buildings and quickly made his way directed by Winston and Athena. They led him to a less-guarded door that was being used by caterers for the dinner that night.

Reporters were the only ones allowed close enough to get a good visual, and it was left to Hanzo to scope out the location of their targets from within their midst. He pulled a voice recorder from the pocket of his pants and brought the sunglasses back down to rest on his nose. Zenyatta disappeared to make quiet inquiries to those gathered outside the Hall with picket signs and bold t-shirts with the bandana still secured around his head.

McCree kept a running commentary on the comm the moment they split up.

“Y’should just call me Jesse.” He was saying as Hanzo elbowed his way into the crowd of reporters flocking around the huge open doors of City Hall. “Y’n’Genji both make my name sound all blocky fer some reason. Mei don’t do that. Is it a Japanese thing?”

Irritated, and ready to tell him to shut up and keep the line clear for the mission, he explained, “Chinese inflections and tones differ from-”

“Yeah, yeah, pardner, that stuff goes over my head anyways.” The buzz of activity made it difficult to hear even with the commlink right in his ear. “Go on then, give it a shot. Call me Jesse.”

Hanzo balked. “It’s improper.” From his spot, he could see a golden limousine pull up, and the crowd pushed back behind the hedges began to undulate as they all moved forward to get a better look or a closer position to yell.

“Shimada-san, this ain’t Nippon and I ain’t a proper fella to begin with. You can’t butcher it anymore than you do my surname, anyways. Jesse. Jeh-see. See? Rolls right off the tongue.”

_Not proper,_ said the man who took the time to remember proper Japanese honorifics.

“Does Genji use your given name?” He asked instead. He outstretched an arm to shove his recorder in one of the incoming delegates’ face, following the lead of the professional vultures around him. One man speaking to himself in a mass of raised voices was easily overlooked.

“Yeah, sometimes. He called me Jesse-kun once, then made a face and never did it again.”

“I do not blame him. It sounds ridiculous.”  

“Aw, come on! You call Mei by her first name!”

“Your last name is your call sign. Mei’s name is hers. The same applies to the majority of our agents. ”

“Agent McCree, the guard rotation will begin in five minutes. Be sure to be within the building in that time.” Athena reminded them calmly.

“Copy that, ma’am.” To Hanzo, he said, “Yeesh, fine. How about a nickname, then?”

Hanzo sneered and was carried by the reporters into the building and into the foyer, only to be gently pushed back by security. He took a careful look around the wide room and noted the people going up the two staircases that split off the center carpet and curved up to meet halfway on the second level. Two of the eight suspects provided by Athena’s algorithm stood guard at the door, wearing Helix Security uniforms. “Two on the second level, guarding the door to the conference room.” He reported to Winston and his teammates. To McCree, he responded with, “Do you prefer fool or _baka?”_

“Something is wrong.” Zenyatta’s voice joined theirs on the comm.

“What is it, agent?” Winston’s voice crackled in his ear. A particularly harsh shove from a bold reporter threw him and a few others towards the wall just inside the doors.  

“I see one of the suspects in the crowd of protesters. He matches the image I have on file. He is instigating for violence, making allegations that the delegates are at fault for Mondatta’s murder for staying complacent until his death urged them to action. He demands vengeance and claims the mayor is a pharisee for daring to take action only at the threat of violence in the aftermath of tragedy. Many are resisting, but many more are in his thrall.”  

“Can you diffuse the situation, or do you think you would be recognized from your time with the Shambali?” Winston asked.

“They are followers of Mondatta, but not part of the Shambali. I have not seen any of my brothers or sisters. I will attempt to bring about peace. My identity is safe. I kept the headscarf.”

The crowd of reporters moved as a unit once again, the power in their numbers too much for the security guards to keep them outside the entrance. Hanzo let himself be pushed towards the back of the group so he could sneak past the guards and into a door marked maintenance.

He clicked the door shut behind him and was careful not to trip over any wiring on the floor. Numbani, being as technologically advanced as it was, kept their copious circuit breakers and control panels out of sight in a series of narrow hallways designed for a single person to navigate should something need repairing. He was to use the maintenance shafts keep hidden on his way to the top level. His role was to secure the surveillance room that they were reasonably sure was being run by a pair of assassins, if the sudden change in personnel was anything to go on. Zenyatta deviated from the plan at his decision to stay outside. McCree was to take out a lookout, the suspect most likely to put out the kill order.

As if called by the thought, he piped up again. “Did you just call me a cow!?”  

Hanzo sighed, but answered in a low, measured tone. “Shouldn’t you be busy looking for your mark in the back offices?”

“I am!”   

“Then you should be focused on the task at hand!” Nevermind that Hanzo had been playing along, but now they were in the thick of it. Sure he had made it to the back of the building, he cautiously opened a thin hatch to peek out and saw an empty hallway ending in a set of ascending stairs. If his mental map was correct, they would lead up to the offices McCree was currently handling and join another set leading up to the third and final floor. He climbed out of the hatch, took Storm Bow out of its case, letting it unfold to its full height, uncapped the top of the tube, and made his way up.

“I’ve got my eye on the sonuvabitch. He’s packin’ EMP’s.” McCree responded quietly after a lull. “Look, Shimada-san. I’m fine with callin’ you Shimada-san if that’s what you’re comfortable with. All I’m sayin’ is none of my friends call me ‘McCree’ outside of a mission.”

“I don’t recall ever telling you that you were limited to using my surname.” Hanzo heard the faint whiz of a bullet passing through a silencer before he saw the gunslinger himself or his falling victim. He ducked behind a decorative file case to avoid being seen by a passing guard and helped McCree lug the corpse into a supply closet.

“Faux pas, Shimada-san. Faux pas. And I’m not very creative when it comes to nicknames.” McCree grinned, still whispering. They both ducked down at a sign of movement.

The movement resulted in a pair of chrome heads walking to the stairs, heads bent low together, discussing something quietly. They wore the caterer’s uniforms. Hanzo recognized one as a possible threat from their intel. Once they were gone, they split back up. McCree went to check the next room and Hanzo reached for a wall panel that slid open when pushed.

For a short while, he heard the sound of raised voices. His internal map put him just outside the conference room. He found another door, checked for guards, ran up another flight of stairs, and found the tinted black one-way windows of the surveillance room. He met no resistance on his way up. Perhaps they had all gone downstairs to help secure the doors. Regardless, the quiet set his nerves on edge.

“Let’s see…” drawled McCree in his ear. “Yeah, I got nothin’. Lulu took Solo already. Unless you ain’t against me callin’ you plain ol’ archer. Alright, I’m clear down here. How’s the path to the surveillance room?”

“Clear. Archer?” He went up the last set of stairs and paused just outside the door to his goal. He nocked an arrow and held another at the ready between his fingers. There was an open window spanning half the height of the wall facing out towards the sea of reporters and protesters. He saw one of Athena’s drones mingling in between the media’s. The twinkling lights of a city beginning to light up in preparation for the night made a picturesque backdrop. Yells were carried through by an early evening wind.  

“I mean, it’s what ya are, darlin’.” McCree sounded out of breath.

Hanzo had half a mind to call him a _rōnin_ after all.

“I suppose I prefer ‘archer’ to ‘dar-’.” He was cut short by the sound of a gunshot and a scream. He redirected his sights to the protesters below and watched in horrified fascination as they began to break apart. Some ran away, others converged around a single omnic whose eyes had turned a dull red. A pistol was in its hand, the weapon crackling with the blue sizzle of ammo meant to bring down an omnic with a single shot. A few meters away, Zenyatta’s orbs broke free of his bag to form their usual wheel.

“Agents,” Zenyatta’s cool voice was tinged with a hint of panic. “I believe you will soon be receiving company. My words have fallen upon deaf ears, and this man has preyed on the fears of those in mourning. They mean to take the building. There has been a death, I am engaging with force.”

“I’m picking up a disturbance similar to those recorded during the crisis!” Athena’s voice rang clear. “It matches activity in Giza! Agent Zenyatta, retreat!”

“I must make sure those innocent are secure.”

“Get out of there! We won’t risk you too! Get to a safe distance, aid those where you can, but don’t let yourself get infected!” Winston ordered. “McCree, Hanzo! Take down those marks the second you’re convinced of their involvement in the plot! Watch each other’s backs! We’re in contact with Lúcio, he’s urging his fans to get to safety. The city’s gone on high alert!”

More eyes turned red.

From inside the surveillance room, Hanzo heard a command shouted through a radio connection. “It’s Anubis, but it’s spreading slowly! We’re on lockdown! Close the doors, I repeat: close those doors! Gather all civs into the conference room and keep it secure! Don’t forget the staff! Round them up, make sure every person is accounted for!”

“You heard the man, get ready.” A distinctly robotic voice said.

Hanzo kicked the door open just as McCree began yelling in his ear.

“Talon staged this!” Hanzo took aim and shot an arrow through the chest of an omnic that had risen, seen him, and lit up the same red as its accomplice outside. “If they take the building, then the bastards inside will take advantage of the panic to make their kills and cover Talon’s hand in this! That’s their signal, it has to be!”

Two down, five were left inside the building, one wreaking havoc outside..

Another omnic standing just out of sight tackled Hanzo and his bow clattered to the floor. They scrapped, but the sheer weight of his opponent had Hanzo at a disadvantage. He was pushed back out of the room, and a hooked foot around the back of his ankle knocked him off balance. It gripped him by the neck and pushed him back over the ledge of the window. Hanzo felt arrows fall out of his quiver and into the panic below. He growled and braced his legs against the wall before he met the same fate as his ammo. The omnic was thrown off of him by a charging rush of red. Hanzo fell back to his feet and rubbed at his neck while he watched McCree wrestle the omnic to the ground. He emptied a bullet into its skull, silencer pressed against its forehead. Three down. One outside. Four to go.     

“We’re securing civilians! Use non-lethal force! Prepare riot gear!” shouted the man on the radio. Riot gear for omnics meant deaths. An EMP level safe for an older model omnic would do no harm to newer ones. The dose capable of knocking out a newer one would kill an older. Talon was steps ahead of them. Hopefully Zenyatta would be able to keep casualties to a minimum.

“The situation outside is escalating.” The monk informed them. McCree picked up Storm Bow and returned it to its arrow-less archer. They rushed into the surveillance room and slid open a tinted window to view the delegation below just as the radio announced that the mob had made it through the main doors.

“Hey archer, don’t reckon you got any of ‘em fancy ricochet arrows hidden somewhere else?” McCree gestured at the empty quiver at his back. “Sure would do us a heckuva lotta good right about now.”

“I do not.” Hanzo answered, voice full of regret and careful calculation. He could spot all four of their marks fretfully milling amongst the rest of the terrified mix of humans and omnics. Without a scatter arrow to take out all of the threats simultaneously, there were not many options present. If one was shot down, the rest would surely act before the inner doors of the conference room were breached. Not to mention they would give away their location.

“Agent Hanzo! What’s your status?”

“We’ve got a visual on the conference room and have located four of the remaining marks but none of their eyes are red. I am out of arrows. Currently considering our next move.”

“My calculations show that the inner doors will be breached in four minutes at the current rate. Helix has called for reinforcements, they are winning their fight. Talon will have to act soon. Winston and I will deliberate a safe way to intervene.” said Athena.

He supposed one of the cowboy’s flashbangs could be used, but they would have precious seconds to get down there and subdue the threats before the effect wore off. And something that obvious would also easily alert Talon of their presence and speed along the assassination.

McCree was reloading Peacekeeper and taking in the scene below them with calm, assessing eyes. Hanzo knew what he was thinking of doing, and he also knew it would not end in mission success.

“Stand down. You are an excellent marksman, McCree.” He tried to reason. “But your specialty is at mid range, and your marks are not keeping still. It is mayhem down there! If you miss the shots, Talon will be alerted of our position and give the kill order. If you do not aim and shoot quickly enough, it will happen regardless! We are better off waiting for Winston and Athena to find another solution!”

McCree flicked his gun, closing the barrel, pulled off the silencer and turned to face him. “Right now we don’t got much of a choice. Talon’s got an opening, they’re not gonna wait much longer. We gotta take ‘em down now before we get any visitors.” He nodded at the open door, “I got something that’ll take ‘em down fer sure. Trust me.”

Hanzo moved to stand in front of the window. “Your gun is not capable of such a feat.”

“I said trust me, will ya? I can do it. I jus’ need you to watch my back. It… I don’t like using this unless I have to, and right now it’s the only thing we got.” He made to shove Hanzo aside, but Hanzo stood his ground.

“What is this you speak of?”

“It’s better if I just show ya, Shimada-san.”　

“You will excuse me if I do not find that enough to be reassuring.”

“Goddamn, get over yourself and give a guy some credit, will you? I need you to trust me and watch my back for a dang minute. The marks will go down, I promise. Could you do that?” Impatience raised the volume of McCree’s voice.

No.

“Yes.” He relented and moved to the side.

McCree had to kneel down on one leg to comfortably aim over a desk to not risk being seen by those down below. Hanzo was tense beside him, eyeing the doorway to their right and considering what he could do to keep any intruders at bay. His bow was only so effective as a melee weapon.

That’s when he felt it.

A shift in the air. The world tipping to straighten itself out. It was the strangest feeling. Like everything was standing still, centered around McCree, and time altered around him. The world bent to the will of the cowboy and his gun. He took his aim and right on cue, dots of red lit up in the crowd below. Hanzo could swear he could see them reflected in the gunslinger’s pupils.

The dragons roared a warning at the back of his mind.

Had they, just as he, finally figure out the caliber of killer they had been associating with all this time? Did they believe Hanzo to be in danger? The dragons were selfish and self important. Those that carried the label of ‘friend’ by Hanzo meant nothing to them other than a half-read memo not to devour them if their rage was unleashed.

But Hanzo wasn’t part of the group McCree was lining up to kill. What was setting them off? He studied their surroundings. Still clear for the moment. No sign of danger.

_Matte._

_Chigau._ [13]

Glimmering at an angle through the open door and window, a line of red. Hanzo turned to look down at McCree next to him. There it was, on his hat, right along the back of the trim and neat between two decorative bullets. A red dot. McCree’s finger moved off the trigger guard. The dragons writhed beneath his skin in rising panic.

_“It’s high noon.”_

McCree, and by extension, those he was attempting to save were seconds away from an early grave. McCree and his Peacekeeper were the only things standing between the world and a second omnic uprising.

Hanzo could take a step, take a stand, and join in their burden. Just a step, and he would live up to the oath he had taken when he gave his faith and his life to a band of wishful heroes.

He didn’t have arrows. He didn’t have options. _Jikan ga nai._ He didn’t even have time to think. He acted. He took the step and braced himself. [14]

The bullet didn’t touch McCree. It didn’t make any noise past a whistle and a dull _thwap_ as it embedded itself in the right side of Hanzo’s chest, in between his ribs.

He belatedly thought of Genji.

The pain was immediate and absolute. He swallowed a cry as the momentum threatened to push him back against McCree. He made himself twist and fall to the side. He watched with strange fascination the way McCree shot. Four rounds in the span of time it took Hanzo to blink. Loud, reverberating within the confines of the small room. The marks went down. Perfect. He waited until the last shot rung out to reach over and tug McCree down before the sniper took another shot.

Breathing was all of a sudden very hard. Gasp for air as he might, all he managed were wet coughs that left a mist of blood on the palm of his hand. Getting oxygen in his lungs was painful, impossible.

McCree scrambled back up to make sure that Talon’s omnics were neutralized. There were screams. The fallen marks were innocent, as far as those below knew. If McCree was found, he would be taken into custody. He had to tell him to hurry and get out.

“Get- ” He didn’t quite manage it before another cough overtook him.

Hanzo felt hands on his shoulders, heard a new voice amidst all the yelling. Closer, deeper. He was being moved. Another shot grazed his shoulder, where his heart would have been if McCree weren’t moving them out of sight of the window. The sniper was not happy to have missed their target. He wouldn’t be, were he in their shoes. His right side felt warm and wet. Another cough, another spray of blood. This time the hands pinning his arms to his side kept him from covering his mouth, and he saw it stain the metal of McCree’s arm. They were running, or, McCree was running and tugging him along, a warm steady presence at his side. The florescent lights overhead were too bright, everything was too distracting. He wanted to be able to hear what was going on below. He began to close his eyes.

Suddenly the voice was _right there_. “Oh no you don’t, archer! Stay with me! Keep your eyes open, you hear me?”

He did as he was told. McCree was demanding it, and he saw no reason why obeying would be a bad idea. He thought about the fact that their support was far away, and clarity hit when he realized he was most likely going to die.

“There you are. Come on, you keep those pretty eyes open! Let me see ‘em.”

McCree was rambling. He spoke of his brother, the relief Genji would feel to have Hanzo back on base safe and sound. A spiteful part of him whispered that at least if he died, Genji would not be left without a brother. There was a pressure on his side now, what felt like McCree’s hand pressing something against the hole in his chest. Despite what McCree had told him to do, his vision began to blur, and everything seemed like an odd dream.

In his other ear, his voice rang clear and jarring. “This is McCree, Zenyatta, come in! We’ve got an agent down. Hanzo’s been hit, sounds like it pierced his lung! We’re located- ”

He stopped paying attention. His chin rested against his neck, and through half-open eyes he saw an amount of red that made Hanzo sure he should be dead already. That much blood was past a comfortable liter. No, wrong again. It spanned the entirety of his chest. Red bordered in orange. It was the tattered _sarape_.

“Shit. No no no no, come on! Stay with me, Shimada!” The sound of footsteps drawing near. “Hanzo! Fuck!” He was hoisted up and carried up a set of stairs. The movement sent more pain spiking down his back.  

Is this what Genji had felt? Did it even come close?

A click alerted Hanzo that McCree was pulling back the safety on his gun.

Consciousness was a fickle moth, flitting between the darkness and the light at its own discretion. His thoughts ceased to make sense, the world faded out one last time and the only thing Hanzo could do was listen. He was lowered to the ground and McCree’s warmth left. He heard a woman singing as the comfort of emptiness took him. Her voice smooth and dark, a one-woman choir beckoning him to embrace nothingness. The words made no sense, but he clung to them, a bit of madness he could discern in the darkness of his quieting mind.

 

_“L'araignée gypsie va pouvoir travailler, et chanter, en tissant des fils d'argent…”_ [15]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mira mira mira. McCree listens to terrible country music, yea, no one’s doubting that pero era mafioso and corridos are their shit. But alas, soy del sur and i hate norteñas y narcocorridos, so i can forgive McCree his gangbanger ways but not his taste in music. #TeamLúcio. Also I vote that the US and Japan go the route of Canada and get rid of pennies. Please. I jingle worse than McCree when my coin purse is on me. 
> 
> [1]Covert  
> [2]I play to win!  
> [3]Thanks  
> [4]Fuck  
> [5]Hey, Hanzo. McCree’s clever, isn’t he?  
> [6]He is... a clever fool… so to speak.  
> [7]Whoa! A compliment? No way!  
> [8]But it’s only apparent when he takes off the stupid hat. (someone pls check my japanese)  
> [9]Genji gets cut off telling Hanzo, it's not polite to make fun of McCree in front of others  
> [10]Well you know what?  
> [11]Bollocks, balls  
> [12]a loanword  
> [13]Wait, wrong.  
> [14]He had no time  
> [15]the itsy bitsy spider in French
> 
> Thank you for your kudos and your comments ilu


	9. The Road to Recovery is Paved With Realizations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Or, the one where Hanzo graduates to ‘sweetheart’.  
> Now if you’ll excuse me i’m going to hide behind a pile of notebooks to avoid my coworker’s pitying looks at the fact that this election is the absolute pits. 
> 
> See end notes for translations, if you're on pc u can hover over for the kanji/arabic

When he was a kid, his mom had been afraid of spiders.

Not rats, those she killed ruthlessly with a broom and well placed traps beneath kitchen appliances. Not scorpions, whose tails she severed with a crush of her heel. Coyotes ran at the sound of a car horn. Snakes weren’t quick enough to escape the swing of her machete.

She hadn’t been afraid of guns, whose barrels she stared down with disinterest while she hid him behind her skirts. A single mother toting a kid was easy prey for gangsters who didn’t know better than to mess with the runaway daughter of a drug lord. When she left Mexico, when she ran from her father’s threats and belts and fists, she left her fear behind. Jesse was only able to make sense of her past when he wove together bits and pieces from the tales she told to scare him into behaving.

The rest he learned in the homes of distant relatives when he was tossed back and forth like a hot potato that no one wanted. Even if he was the spitting image of his father, he was his mother’s son, and the McCree’s hadn’t had the decency to bury his parents together. So Jesse had hidden his guilt, fear, and sadness by swallowing their hate and throwing his lot in with the Deadlocks. Scrawny and angry and newly tattooed, hand wrapped around the grip of his mother’s gun. Head held high like his father and unafraid like his mother.

No, his mother hadn’t been afraid of anything, not even the encroaching loneliness that threatened to eat away at Jesse from the inside, just as it had her.  

_Pero arañas siempre la hicieron correr hacia él o su padre, pegando un grito al cielo peor que la llorona._ [1]

Jesse wasn’t afraid of spiders.

_“Mais le soleil a chassé la pluie.”_ [2]

Amélie Lacroix wasn’t a spider. She was a ghost, and his mama had raised Jesse to be superstitious.

“C’mon, Miss Amélie. Keep that big gun o’ yours down. Hands in the air, nice and slow. We don’t need a demonstration on who’s the quicker shot.”

“Quicker, perhaps. But who is more accurate?” She did as told, shouldering her rifle as she had just started to reach for it. Her English had gotten better since the last time McCree had seen her, running security on some flashy gig back in the summer of ‘67. Two years later and Gabe had handed him command of an op so he could attend her husband’s funeral. She detached her grappling hook from the ledge of the roof, raised her arms and stepped up calm as you please, eyeing what was sure to soon become Hanzo’s corpse with expressionless eyes.

No. Jesse had gotten them up to the roof, and Zenyatta was on his way, led by Athena and Winston. Hanzo would be fine. He had one of the biotic emitters Angie had made sure they carried in their kits stuffed in his trouser pocket, and McCree had wrapped his _sarape_ and then Hanzo’s scarf as tight as he could over the bullet hole. He’d be fine. Amélie and her damn timing were just another unexpected hurdle, something else to get past, like the second omnic uprising happening down below them.

“At this distance, it ain’t exactly a question of accuracy.” He spoke as he considered what shit luck he had. Or maybe this was Hanzo’s shit luck, that the ghost had thrown her web into their path at the moment they could least afford it. “How’re you alive, Miss Amélie? How’s it that you went missing just when Gérard turned up dead? How’d you go from happily married to toting a rifle and blue?”

She simply continued her song, humming a tune that belonged in a classroom. If his memory served him well, that’s exactly where she’d gotten it from. She had been a school teacher, after all.

A sniper like her couldn’t win in a fight against a fighter like him. She hadn’t expected them either, and it had been too late to redirect the swing of her tether.

“Answer me, Amélie.” He ordered, keeping his arm steady and aimed at what was exposed of her head beyond her strange helmet.

“That is not my name.” She surprised him by actually responding, but she said it with no bite. Cold, but not how Hanzo had been cold. She had no emotion in her. She probably didn’t even have any blood pumping beneath her icy skin.

“Well shoot, you sure look like Amélie, but I’ll play. Go ahead. Who are you?”

“ _Ce n'est pas un jeu_. I am the Widowmaker, and your Overwatch was foolish to take what was mine. Your team cost me that gauntlet. What will you cost them?”  [3]

He skipped over the threat to their lives and went for the most interesting part. “Widowmaker? Honey, ain’t that just a bit morbid?”

She took up her silence again. She cast a glance over at the ground and the mayhem beneath them. Then she cast a look to the skies. Jesse could hear the sound of an approaching helicopter. Winston’s warning in his ear told him that it wasn’t friendly. Talon was coming to collect their weapon. If he took his gun off of Widowmaker to get Hanzo back inside, she would probably shoot them. Or maybe not. She didn’t seem very interested in them.

“I am almost there.” Zenyatta assured through the comm.

“So, they could not have you.” Amélie said at the same time. Jesse almost missed it in his panic to figure out how to get out of his present mess.

“What?” he barked. Hanzo had gone awfully quiet behind him.

She smiled sweetly, motioned to her ear. “They’re bickering. Some want you taken in,” she nodded at Hanzo, “That one as well. Valuable assets. Oh!” She gave a small laugh. “ _Oups._ That was not meant for your ears. Ah, well. Helix is too close. Some other time, then.”

So her apathy ran both ways. He could work with that. “Talon wants us? Why? Amélie!” He had to shout to be heard over the sound of the helicopter’s rotating blades. He kept his aim as he ran back to what little shelter the awning of the roof exit provided and bent down to drag Hanzo with him. His body left a trail of red and Jesse fought to keep his heart from coming out of his mouth at the paleness of the archer’s face.    

“They want you.” She confirmed, voice nearly carried by the gust of her handlers’ arrival. A ladder dropped in front of her. Her heeled feet made it up the first rung. “And they will have you. They had me.”

If it were possible for Jesse’s stomach to drop any farther, it would. She let out another laugh.

_“Ça pique, n'est-ce pas?”_ She said as she was lifted up, her long hair whipping in the air around her. She took aim and Jesse followed the line of her shot to see a blue spider-like bomb latch onto the wall right next to them.[4]

He dove to move them out of range of the explosion only to realize too late that it was motion activated.

Everything was lost in a haze of green. And then the door behind them slammed open.

“We must be quick, the situation below is being dealt with and Helix’s reinforcements have arrived. They are-- Oh. Oh, my friends.”

He had enough oxygen left in the blood in his brain to not let go of Hanzo when Zenyatta pulled them to safety. He sat up where Zenyatta deposited them, Hanzo’s body slumped over his middle. If Hanzo’s breathing had been slow and shallow before, now it was virtually nonexistent.

That poison was a death sentence. Hanzo was dying right in his arms, lips pale and slightly parted, black hair a mess spilling onto his bloodstained shoulder and pressed against McCree’s chest. It wasn’t just the gas still filling Jesse’s lungs that made it difficult to breathe.

“Zenyatta!” he begged desperately, but damn, the man was no Angie. What would he tell Genji? Fuck, how would he look his brother in the eye and tell him that Hanzo had died saving his dumb ass because Jesse had forgotten how to shut a fucking door? Besides them, he saw something begin to glow.

“McCree, I apologize, but the orb of harmony’s benefits can only be received by one person at a time.” The shining orb floated into his line of sight, and settled over Hanzo’s chest. Jesse didn’t loosen his vice grip on the man even as he had to look over his shoulder to cough his lungs out.

A minute. For an endless, torturous, horrible minute, Hanzo stilled completely. Then came a breath and a weak cough full of blood. The trail of which was quickly wiped away with the edge of his doubly red _sarape._

“I have stalled the effect of the poison and stopped the blood loss. But his lung has collapsed, and I cannot fix that. He can still breathe with his remaining left, but he is weak. He has gone into shock. We need Lúcio.”

“He’s on his way!He’ll take you straight to the airport and then straight here.” Winston was saying. Had he been speaking to him for some time? Jesse didn’t know, he was too busy watching life return to the body he was holding.

Hanzo breath was shallow, unsteady, but present. He gave a wheeze that sounded an awful lot like his brother’s name. The orb pulsed. His eyelids fluttered, trying to open.

“Hanzo? Can you hear me?” Zenyatta asked, voice hopeful.

_“Omoshirosouni shinderu.”_ Hanzo mumbled hoarsely. [5] Zenyatta gave a considerate hum, then shook his head and his orb glowed even brighter.

“Not today, my friend.”

There was a rush of loud incoming footsteps. From the roof access door burst out a group of armed soldiers dressed in Helix combat suits. The one at the lead in royal blue held an arm back, keeping the squad away from the green that could still be seen lingering in the air. Jesse saw a gun lift and aim at them. Zenyatta paid the threat no mind and kept working.

Masks were pulled on, and Helix’s reinforcements had Overwatch’s agents circled at gunpoint.

Then the leader lowered their gun. _"Ya lahwy!”_ [6]

Jesse nearly fell back in relief at the sound of her voice. She motioned for her men to lower their weapons. _“Akhi,_ please tell me that was not you!”  [7] Fareeha pushed her beaked visor up and away from her face. Her dark skin shown in the bright lights of the city around them, sweat glistening on her brow and painting her as some sort of otherworldly goddess descending upon them to either save them or strike them down. “Was that you who shot those omnics?”

“Yeah, you can blame me for that.” Jesse managed to choke out, eyes tearing up and lungs burning. He was getting dizzier by the second. His vision was going black, his legs were going numb. “Listen, Faree, we’re in a right pickle here. Can you help?”

“Jesse, I am part of the ‘kill everything’ squad. I am assuming that right now, you are part of the ‘everything’. You’re going to have to do better than that.”

“I will, honest to God. But first--” He didn’t get to finish his sentence. Fareeha had to lunge downward to catch him before his back hit the ground.

* * *

 

He heard the sound of music.

“Ah, there you are!” Lúcio’s blond dreadlocks were the first thing Jesse’s eyes focused on. They were out of their usual tie, and they dangled close to Jesse’s face as Lúcio leaned over him. “Yo, he’s awake!” he called out to someone behind him. To him, he gave a cautious smile. “C’mon Woody, gimme a sign. A ‘howdy’. Anything.”

“How’s Hanzo?” He asked as he sat up slowly, hand pressed against his aching head. He noticed something missing. “Where’s m’hat?”

“I’ll take that too! He’s fine!” He announced to what turned out to be Felicia and the inside of the jet they had flown into Numbani on. Lúcio was standing next to him, Crossfade suit still on and emitting a light beat that was being cast over both him and Hanzo, who was draped over the seats across from them. Zenyatta was nowhere to be seen.

“Hanzo’s hanging in there.” Lúcio went on. “Sorry. I couldn’t risk helping you much until I was sure he was stable.” He ended his explanation by reaching over to the next row of seats to grab his hat.

“Zenyatta?” His throat felt raw, but he supposed that was a side effect of choking on toxic gas. He took his hat, feeling comfort at the weight of it back on his head.

“Volunteered to stay behind when Helix found you all. They wanted to keep all of us, but Winston put in some calls and got a compromise. Zenyatta’s staying for a while to help ease tensions and explain our interference. But good news is: witness accounts prove you’re not a murderer! Our story checks out, and that Pharah lady is backing us!”

Jesse groaned. “She’s gonna get fired for helping us.”

“She could always join Overwatch.” Lúcio pointed out. The thought had its merits. He only had to think of Angela to consider it a great idea. Lúcio talked. He explained what had happened after he passed out, and Jesse listened quietly while he watched Hanzo take uneven breaths.

* * *

 

Angela was waiting for them at the airport in the dead of night. She was dressed to the nines in her Valkyrie suit and powering up her staff the second she laid eyes on Hanzo. Reinhardt helped her set up a stretcher and pushed him onto his van. The audiomedic finally turned off his music with an exhausted sigh and was directed towards a different plane by his agent.

The ride to base was short. On the way, Winston politely requested that he write up a report on the mission to send off to Geneva when he had the time and energy. Once Reinhardt parked by the big loading doors, McCree thought he could sneak away to do just that, but he was hauled to the medbay by the well-meaning doctor.

She gave him a quick ping with her staff, judged him well enough, and rushed off to treat her more urgent patient. The second he walked out of the medbay, Jesse got an armful of metal and flesh that backed him right back against the barely closed door.

“Genji!” He managed to say once the wind knocked out of him had been replaced with a new lungful,“Genji-kun, hey, hey, it’s alright! He’ll be alright, you’ll see!”

Genji made a choked off noise, trembled in his arms, and Jesse panicked for a second once he realized that beneath his mask, Genji was crying.

He had only ever seen Genji cry once. And that had only been under the combined unholy trinity of alcohol, an anniversary, and the kind of heavy feelings that could only be spoken aloud at three in the morning. A tearful confession that had made hate burn deep, directed at the man that had just saved his life.

“I thought that-!” Genji’s voice was raw, shaking with fear and anger born out of a sense of uselessness, “We were just about to land and Winston called to tell me that Hanzo-” He broke off again to take a deep breath. “You and Zenyatta were still fighting, the news was saying it was a second uprising, reporters were dying right in front of the fucking cameras and you three were-! You came back, but my master was not with you. Athena had to tell me-”

It seemed that the combined unholy trinity of a threat to Hanzo’s, Zenyatta’s and Jesse’s lives was also enough to send the man spiraling.

“Hey, we’re alright.” Jesse soothed him with a comforting hand at the back of his neck, “The world’s alright. It almost wasn’t, and you were scared. Fuck, I was scared, seein’ all them eyes light up red.” _Seeing all the red stained on Hanzo’s crisp white shirt,_ Jesse didn’t say. “Zenyatta’s fine, I’m fine, Hanzo’ll be right as rain, you’ll see. Give Angie time to work her magic. Have a lil’ faith.”

He gently pushed Genji, and together, arms still entwined, they awkwardly shuffled back to one of the benches set against the wall facing the medbay. Jesse paused, unwilling to pull his arms back if Genji still needed the comfort of a hug, but the decision was made for him when Genji gave a shaky exhale and plopped down on the bench, pulling Jesse down with him.

With a little repositioning and elbows nearly making contact with unfortunate places, they settled on the bench, half on top of each other, legs tangled, with Genji’s head pillowed on Jesse’s shoulder. They sat while Genji tried to compose himself and Jesse tried to remember the last time they had been together like this.

Maybe that one mission to La Paz, when Angela had gotten her staff shot out of her hand and then gotten shot herself. Who saves the savior? Genji had nearly killed himself to get her out. McCree had fought Gabe tooth and nail to be allowed to go see them at the Watchpoint in Bolivia. Genji had snuck them both into the medbay to check on her during the night, then she woke up only long enough to tell them both off for disobeying medbay visiting hours. But after that, she smiled and washed away their fear.

_Heroes never die._

And Hanzo was a hero now, wasn’t he? He took a bullet so that Jesse’s wouldn’t stray.

They sat in tense, worried silence for hours. Jesse would nod off, only to be awoken by some noise coming through the closed medbay doors. It seemed the Doomfist mission, the crying, and the stress had tuckered Genji out, because he was passed out on his shoulder, the light of his visor off, the lights on his body pulsing softly like they did when he was powered down.

Angela came out to warn them that there had been a complication during the surgery, but when she spotted Genji, she directed the message at Jesse in a whisper. The poison in Widowmaker’s mine had done more damage to Hanzo’s lung than just the .38 caliber bullet she had dug out of his chest.

“Will he be okay?” He breathed, unwilling to wake Genji up to bad news.

“Both Zenyatta and Lúcio’s work froze any further progress of the poison, and made sure that his other lung kept working despite the strain. His blood pressure is back to normal, and I had him on an IV and an ET tube while I worked the poison out of his system.” She sounded exhausted. “I’m just glad we upgraded the printer. I had to reconstruct a portion of his middle lobe. Finding a tissue sample not weakened considerably wasn’t easy. He’s on a ventilator now, and I’ll keep him on it for a few hours.”

“But will he be okay?” He repeated.

Angela nodded. “Yes. I promise, Jesse. I’ll let you know when you can see him.” And then she was gone. Jesse fought a full-body shiver for the sake of the snoring sleeping beauty on his shoulder. Then he fell asleep too.

When he woke up an unknown amount of time later, Genji was still asleep on top of him, and McCree was ridiculously sore everywhere. But he didn’t move a muscle, and instead chose to watch his friend from the corner of his eye.

When was the last time he had seen Genji sleep?

It’s not that he and Genji hadn’t been spending time together since the recall reunited them. They had. But mostly they had just trained together, or hung out with the group in the rec room. With Zenyatta in the picture, Genji didn’t come to him to talk anymore. It stung a bit, Jesse was willing to admit, to have been replaced as a confidant. But the important thing was that Zenyatta had finally managed to undo the knot of self-hatred and despair that had eaten away at parts that Genji had been unwilling to show even him.

While Jesse drowned in his thoughts, Genji woke up and broke the silence. “Any news?”

“Angie had a bit of trouble settin’ up the surgery, but she said he’s fine.” He yawned wide, and Genji made an apologetic noise and made to get off of him, but a metal hand against his metal head kept him in place.

“You stay right there, darlin’. I ain’t opposed to bein’ used as a pillow.” he kept his head firmly on top of the cyborg’s.

“Or using me as one.” Genji said, and then asked about what happened on the mission.

So Jesse told him. Genji didn’t interrupt until he had reached the very end. “You know I’m a sittin’ duck when I use Deadeye.”

“He saved your life.” Genji’s voice had taken a turn for the incredulous.

“Genji-kun, I’m pretty sure your brother had a bit more than just lil’ ol’ me on his mind when he decided to test his mortality.”

“No, Jesse.” He lifted his head and Jesse’s was knocked aside in the process. “Do you know what this means?”   

Jesse shook his head. Genji moved so suddenly to face him that he had to hold McCree steady to keep him from falling off the bench. “Do you remember Overwatch’s last mission to Japan? I was head of the op, Reyes handed you over because Morrison still didn’t trust me without supervision.”

“Pfft, yeah. And he wasn’t too happy that I was the answer Gabe gave him. I remember. The time with the noodle shop, right?”

“The very one.” Genji confirmed with a nod.

“I left on the first transport outta there when the job was done. You were supposed to be on the next one. You weren’t.” Jesse tried not to let old bitterness, betrayal, and confusion seep into his words, but he was tired.

“I wasn’t.” Genji admitted, but his voice held no shame.  

“Are we talkin’ ‘bout this now? Shit, you wouldn’t answer me when you came back after recall, what’s got your lips flappin' now?”  

“The fresh reminder of our mortality, Jesse-kun, keep up.” He stopped, made a retching noise, and then went on a bit more somberly. “Did you know, that day was the anniversary of when Angela saved me?”

Jesse nodded. That little detail wasn’t one he had looked over when Genji had gone with the wind and he was stuck in Geneva with a catatonic Gabriel. As much of a mess as those days had been, _el cinco de Mayo_ held double the significance for McCree. A day of celebration shrouded in grief. [8]

But the little detail that didn’t escape Jesse now was that Genji had not referred to that day as the day of his death.

Zenyatta deserved a gift basket, at the very least. Or maybe he’d appreciate a bouquet of flowers more. One with some _borboletas._ [9]

“Destroying the Shimada-gumi did nothing to quell my anger. Neither you nor Angela-sama were enough to make me stay once my mission was complete. The night of my triumph, fate saw fit to show me my brother as he offered my ghost incense and prayers while I hid in the shadows of our home. I knew the clan was after him and what he risked. I knew it was a sign of his remorse. But I didn’t care. I was one breath away from raising my sword and making of him what he made of me.”

Jesse didn’t move a muscle, didn’t make a sound. Genji let out a shuddering breath that turned into a sigh. “I hated him. I hated him so much, but I couldn’t… What did you do when you left Blackwatch, Jesse? Angela-sama told me you left not long after I did.”

“I wandered.” he answered quietly. Genji accepted his answer with a knowing nod.

“After that I… wandered too.”

“You found Zenyatta.” Jesse filled in the blank.

“He saved my life.” Genji’s voice turned into the soft thing it became whenever the omnic was mentioned outside of his presence. “He reminded me that I still had a life, and that it was mine. Not Overwatch’s. Not the family’s. Not my brother’s. My own.”

Jesse made a supportive noise, not really following, but not wanting to risk stopping him either.    

“I let go of my hate. I found Hanzo, brought him here, and found him lost in the same hate that  had once consumed me.”

Did Genji know how the calm of his voice reflected his teacher’s? And the sitting cross-legged wasn’t helping Jesse keep the two apart in his head.

“Hate directed inward, at himself. He was sure he owed his life to me. And I suspect a small part of him still belongs to the family.” Genji grasped Jesse’s shoulder. “But he risked his life for you. He would not have done so if he still considered his life to be mine. You say he had more than you on his mind, McCree, and that may be true. But it brings me happiness to think that at least I did not have a hand in your death. He did not think of me when he saved you.”

Jesse was saved having to think up a response when the medic slid open her door and came to stand in front of the despondent pair.

“He’s awake.” Angela began, but pressed her hand against Genji’s chest before he could rise out of his seat. “And lucid, but only for a few minutes. The pain medication I’ve given him will disorient him soon. Try not to make him speak much. I’ve just removed the ventilator.”

“Thank you, Dr. Ziegler.” Genji disentangled himself from Jesse’s long legs and stood up to follow. Jesse remained seated until Genji reached the doors and looked back at him expectantly.

“I am sure my brother would be glad to know you are alive, Jesse.”

“Oh, he knows. He is the first person he asked after. Followed by you, of course.” Angela remarked offhand.

Genji’s face probably matched Jesse’s shock, under the visor. Jesse stood up slowly and joined them as they walked through the medbay doors.

“Mr. Shimada? There’s someone here to see you.” Angela announced them when they made it past the lab, operating rooms, and check-up area to the sleeping quarters towards the back. Hanzo came into view when she yanked back a long blue curtain.

The ache of fear that had settled in Jesse’s chest loosened a bit at seeing the elder Shimada’s brown eyes open and focused. He still looked pale, but there was no blood on his powder blue hospital gown. His hair was still down, Jesse could see a bloodstained scarf, dress shirt and trousers, as well as his darkened _sarape_ in a metal bin on a nearby counter.

The brothers looked at each other, Genji took off his face plate, the metal detaching with a soft _hiss._ There were tear tracks running down his face. Hanzo looked stricken, and he quickly opened his mouth to speak, but all that came out was a raspy wheeze. Angela rushed off to fetch some water.

Genji let out a wet noise of dismay. Fresh tears ran down the tracks already on his face as he bolted to his brother’s side.  

_“Nakanaide.”_ Hanzo’s voice was thin and weak as Genji took his tattooed hand in his own. If it bothered Jesse to hear the man so beat down, he couldn’t begin to think what Genji was feeling.

_“Nī-chan.”_ The childlike tone in Genji’s voice tore a hole right through Jesse’s heart. He gathered it had had the same effect on Hanzo, because his pained look transformed into remorse.

_“Gomen, Genji."_

_“Baka. Ayamaru hitsuyō wa nai.”_ Genji dashed the tears on his face away with the back of his hand, looking decades younger than he was. Hanzo gave an amused chuckle, or about as much of one as he could manage with his throat such a wreck.

_“Hmmm. Naze naiteru no?”_

_“Urusai.”_ Genji snapped, but he smiled, soft and shaky. The same expression graced Hanzo’s lips. Jesse felt his breath catch.

_“Hai hai.”_ [10]

The smile slipped from his lips when his eyes left his brother. Angela came back and offered him a glass of water which he took with his free hand. As he sat up to drink, his gaze bypassed Angela and settled squarely on him. Jesse gulped. The glass was returned, and when he spoke, his voice was stronger.

“The mission?” he asked. Jesse took a few hesitant steps forward and stopped at the foot of his cot.

“A success, technically speaking. We’re real lucky none of them protesters were armed, it was mostly Zenyatta’s mark that did any killin’ before he got what was comin’ to him. Helix got everything back under control.”

“The delegates?”

“Alive and well and meetin’ again right now to try ‘n’ calm folks down. Zenyatta stayed behind to represent us and do the necessary grovelling.”

Hanzo hummed, satisfied with his answers, and laid back against his bed. Jesse felt bad, the guy looked like something a cat would drag in, but he wasn’t done with the conversation. He just hoped that the man wasn’t too upset at him to have it. He swept his hat off his head and held it over his heart.

“I reckon I should probably start with a ‘thank you’.”

“That is unnecessary.” Hanzo said shortly, but that was mostly due to the remaining scratchiness of his voice. He was watching Genji with a warm look. Relief washed over him. So they were still talking. He didn’t sound too mad about having to save his ass.

“This is about as necessary as it gets! You saved my life, pardner! Be mighty dumb of me not to be grateful.”

“I did not do it for you.”

It was nothing Jesse didn’t already know, but hell if that didn’t bite. He was taken over by a sense of déjà vu. As gingerly as Hanzo was willing to ease forward and meet McCree at some point in the middle, he was just as quick to draw back and put a canyon between them. Jesse swallowed his feelings and spoke up again.

“Alright. _Me doy. No fue por mi._ ” he gave him that much, “But you did it. I’m still alive, and you still got a bullet in the lung. Darlin’, you almost died right in my arms. Beg pardon for bein’ a bit messed up over it.” [11]

“I did what was necessary for the sake of the mission.” Hanzo finally looked up to meet his eyes. The lights in the medbay set them to shining something fierce.

“Why you did it don’t change what you did, sweetheart.”

Genji perked up. He cast a curious glance his way, with what was left of his eyebrows raised. “That one’s new.”

Jesse went on, choosing to ignore him. “I mean it. I owe ya, archer. Heck, my life’s yours.”

Two sets of matching eyes stared at him, identical in shape but contrasting in color.

Genji gave a heavy sigh, “Ah, McCree. You should not say things like that so lightly.”

“I’m not! I mean it!”

“You owe me nothing.” Hanzo cut off the rest of his protest and shut him down completely. “I did not do it for you.” He repeated.

“Sure, pardner.” He said, to ease his mind. Hanzo’s eyes were already starting to droop shut. “Sure.”

Angela told them that he was out of the woods for now, but asked if one of them would stay with him while she caught up on a few hours’ worth of sleep. “It’d be good if someone he’s comfortable with is here when he wakes up. I have to help Winston deal with the UN and Helix later as well, so I can’t afford to hang around here to do more than the necessary checks.” Genji took up the first shift and commed Mei to see if she would be willing to help out. He then kicked Jesse out with his bloodied _sarape_ and an order to go get some actual sleep. He did as told.

“He hasn’t woken up yet.” Mei whispered the next day when Jesse showed up in the medbay to relieve her. He’d just turned in his mission report to Winston and answered Lena’s questions about the Widowmaker. The encounter had left him in a bad mood, but he gave Mei a smile either way.

“How’s the leg?” He asked her.

“Fine as frog’s hair.” She said with a giggle. “Speaking of frogs, has Lúcio come back yet?”

“Reinhardt’s out pickin’ him up right now.” He answered. She offered him her tablet to pass the time, screen pulled up to one of her movies. He took it and a pair of pink headphones, and then sat down on the chair that had been pulled up next to Hanzo’s bed.

He missed the moment Hanzo woke up, but the rustling of the covers made him look up.

_“...Mada koko ni iru.”_ [12]

“What’s that?” McCree said absently. Then he remembered himself, forgot the movie, and quickly abandoned the tablet once he realized Hanzo was awake. The earbuds were shoved in the front pocket of his shirt.

“You’re still here.” Hanzo repeated.

“Uh...yeah.”

“Why?” He closed his eyes against the brightness of the room. McCree noticed, and got up to turn down the blinds.

“‘Cause I wanna?” He walked back to his seat. Hanzo shifted in order to position himself in a way that would be easier for him to look at his visitor.

“I told you I did not do it for you. You are not in any way obligated to stay wi- ” he winced, “-here.”

McCree gave him a meaningful look. “It’s not an obligation, sweetheart. Genji, Mei, ‘n’ I’ve been takin’ turns. We wanted to make sure you’re okay. How’re you feelin’?”

“About as well as to be expected. The pain will pass. Where are Genji and Mei?”

“Around. Want me to go get ‘em?”

Hanzo shook his head and let his eyes fall closed again. Jesse figured he was going back to sleep and put in his earbuds again.

“What are you watching?”

Jesse paused with his finger over the play button. He wordlessly turned on the projection feature and flicked it up so that Hanzo could see the scene for himself. At the archer’s slight nod, he unplugged the headphones and let the sound of the actress’ voice fill the silent medbay.

After a few minutes, Hanzo muttered a curious, “Is that..?”

“The MEKA girl from the news?” He laughed, “Yeah.”

* * *

 

Because of her tendency to err on the side of caution Angela made them keep their vigil for two whole days, but once she deemed Hanzo well enough to undergo physical therapy his visitors were kicked out of the medbay. One such instance had Mei and Jesse walking past Winston’s lab just in time for Lúcio and Lena to herald them into his workspace. The hole in the wall had been neatly patched with hard light. The architech responsible was seated at a constructed desk pushed against it, typing away at the projected screen of her computer. She gave them each a cordial nod when they entered, and then went back to her work.

“Good news!” Lena chirped. Winston nodded, a slightly hopeful smile on his face.

“Zenyatta’s comin’ back tomorrow! The UN’s gettin’ off our backs! The people of Numbani ain’t lettin’ ‘em put us back in the shadows! The protesters that weren’t infected thanks to Zenyatta are starting a social media campaign in our favor. The world’s callin’ us heroes!” Lúcio pulled up a site on Winston’s screen to show them a wall of social media posts. Mei bounded over to the desk to read them more closely.

“You helped Helix stop another uprising, McCree.” Winston looked proud. Jesse tipped his hat humbly. “With Torbjörn’s help and the UN’s blessings, the Russian government has gotten us into contact with Volskaya Industries. They’re looking into ways we can lead a joint attack on the Siberian Omnium.”

“I’ve always wanted to go to Russia!” Mei commented. Lena shared her agreement.

“But for now,” their commander went on, “Lucheng Interstellar has asked me for a favor. Or, well, they’ve invited me to a fundraising event to pay for continued studies on the Interstellar Journey. I think they just want more of the media there. They’ve, uh, given me four invitations. One for me, Lúcio, Mei, and uh, McCree.”

He gave him a flabbergasted look. “Me!?”

Winston nodded. “It wasn’t arrows they found in those omnics, McCree. Helix turned us in and the UN isn’t keeping secrets from the public. You’ve still got a bounty on your head, but your actions in Numbani are in your favor to getting it annulled and your case reconsidered, insubordination aside.”

Jesse scratched at his beard and grimaced. Politics. He hated them.  

“Pending the UN’s approval, of course.” Winston added.

“The world never got to know what a hero you are when you were with Blackwatch, love. This can be your big break!” Lena smiled encouragingly at him.

“When’s this shindig?” he asked.

“Day after tomorrow.” Lena answered.

“Winston! I think one of these equations is wrong!” Mei butted in, pointing to something on his cluttered desk.

* * *

 

The following evening found Jesse in the medbay, sitting next to Hanzo on the couch in Angela’s office and texting Mei while Hanzo watched a drama that she had loaded onto his tablet in apology for cancelling their movie night. She had panicked when she realized that she didn’t have anything to wear to a fancy scientist gathering. Genji, who had stopped by her room on his way to see his brother, had stayed to provide his ‘professional opinion’.  

“Y’know, I bet he ain’t even just sayin’ that to have an excuse to look at her.” Jesse said as he clicked off his handheld with a bemused expression. He bumped their shoulders to get his attention.

“Fashion was one of Genji’s most loved interests before…” Hanzo looked up from the tense hospital scene on his screen and stopped, unable to get past the past tense of his words. Jesse scrambled to save him from his blunder.

“Oh, Genji always struck me as a fashionista. He told me he had green hair once. That true?”

That startled a laugh out of the man next to him. “Yes! I had forgotten. He did it while we both attended university.”

“Is that when you both learned English?” McCree asked, and then didn’t even give Hanzo the chance to answer. “Y’know, it’s funny. Genji’s been with us a long while. His English is great, but his accent’s a lil’ heavy. You though? You don’t even fuck up the ‘el’ sounds. How come? You study abroad?”

“I did, but it was in Seoul. To answer your first question, our father made us take English lessons while very young. Genji often did not pay attention.”

“Ah.” He had a feeling that the fresh dose of pain meds that Angie had been easing him off were part of the reason Hanzo was being so open and talkative. Jesse would take the easy friendliness while it lasted. He just had to ask questions to keep the archer interested.

“Where did you learn Spanish?” Hanzo beat him to the punch.

Jesse blinked. Hanzo was looking up at him with open curiosity paired with what could be a smile. Korean drama on his lap paused and forgotten. Yep, definitely the pain meds.

He only mentioned his family in a short comment, and instead launched into a story about a mission to Dorado where Reinhardt had gotten into trouble with border patrol when he had tried to sneak back a sack of fresh chorizo. Gabe had been on board with the idea, so it had been left to Jesse to sweet talk the guard into letting it slide and clearing their transport with air traffic control.  
  
“We almost made it too, _pero el condenado guardia torcido_ turned out to be a Muerto, _y no me quedo de otras más que-"_ [13]

“I am aware that I am the one that gave you the opening to resume your mindless babbling, but if you are to do so, at least keep it in a language I can understand!” Hanzo scolded him by giving his arm a backhanded slap.

“Sorry.” he looked down at him with a sheepish grin. Hanzo huffed and held his gaze.  
  
“An interesting tale, but I did not fail to notice that you did not answer my question.” Hanzo gave him a pointed look.

“I’m half Mexican, sweetheart. Bilingual’s a part of the package if your parents care enough.” McCree answered with a shrug and turned when he heard the main doors to the medbay open. Next to him, Hanzo hummed.

“Every time you talk, I am amazed to find you say very little.” He said with a disdainful sniff, and Jesse felt as if one of his arrows had lodged itself right in his chest. It wasn’t fair that Hanzo was paying enough attention to be able to say those kinds of things. It made it seem like he cared, like they were getting to some semblance of close. Jesse faltered. He stared at him, taking in his uncharacteristically fully on _gi_ and the blonde hair tie that had no doubt been borrowed from Angie. His hands ached to fuss, his fingers itched with the need to tuck that ever constant strand of hair over Hanzo’s face behind his ear.

“It’s a talent.” He muttered weakly and pushed his thoughts aside. Angela and Genji appeared in the doorway to her office.

“Fashion crisis averted.” Genji reported with a mock salute. Angela laughed behind her hand and went off to check on one of her spinning experiments. Genji perched at the armrest to Hanzo’s right.

“Your brother here was just telling me how he studied abroad.” Jesse said conversationally.

“Oh, Seoul? Didn’t we run an op there together back when I first joined?” Genji asked.

“Oh yeah!” Jesse laughed at the memory. “You dragged me and Lena to that club and got us yelled at by Morrison!”

“You risked a mission to indulge in your own amusement?” Hanzo interjected from his spot between them. Genji’s visor flashed.

“I risked a mission to get McCree laid.” It was hard to answer with anything but a straight face when he wasn’t showing his face, and Jesse didn’t appreciate the effect one bit.

“Hey!”

“Besides, it was ladies’ night.” Genji went on smoothly.

“And by ladies’ night, he means ladies kept gettin’ their drinks fer free and Genji-kun here seemed a bit too happy about how loose it was gettin’ ‘em.” Jesse accused.

Hanzo muttered something that sounded a lot like _‘playboy’_.

Genji smacked his leg and then reached over to do the same to Jesse. “You and Lena didn’t mind either. Especially not when we found those Japanese girls and I introduced you.”

“I think I can guess where this is going.” Hanzo said with a reproachful look aimed at his brother.

“I’ll bet, eh Hanzo?” Genji said, entirely suggestive.

“You did this enough to me during our time in university.” he said.

“I am the best wingman.” Genji asserted and then nodded at Jesse. _"Tatoeba, kore wa aibō desu. Kakkoī desu ne?"_ [14]

Hanzo was giving him _a look_ that Jesse had learned to distinguish as the one that preceded a scolding or a put-upon sigh. It had ‘beleaguered older brother’ written all over it. This time, it was the scolding. _“Dame.”_ [15]

Genji held up both hands in surrender. Then he glanced at his wrist as if he were wearing a watch. “Angela-sama! Isn’t it past my brother’s bedtime?”

Angie, who had been resolutely keeping quiet throughout their squabble, glanced up from her work. “I don’t know about bedtime, but visiting hours are long over. You should get some sleep, Jesse, before the transport takes off.”

“Come, McCree. You have a mission in a few hours, and Angela-sama has to get my invalid of a brother to bed. Fuck you for that, by the way.” He threw casually at a scandalized Hanzo. Jesse let out a laugh and got a reproachful glare sent his way by both Hanzo and Angela.

“Don’t encourage him.” Hanzo said. Angela nodded. Jesse let himself be pulled to his feet and out of the room by the younger ninja.

“Wouldn’t dream of it, sweetheart!” he managed to call out, along with a hastily thrown, _“Buenas noches!”_ over his shoulder.

_“Buenas noches!”_ Angie parroted.

_“Oyasumi nasai.”_ Hanzo’s voice was nearly drowned by the soundtrack of the drama he had unpaused. [16]

They weren’t even out the medbay doors when Genji piped up. “Thank you. My brother seems more comfortable here now that he has you.” His voice held a grin. A teasing grin. That was his knowing voice. Genji had no right using his knowing voice when Jesse wasn’t even sure of what it was he knew.

“Has me?” Jesse said as he reached to slide the door open.

“I didn’t expect you to do as told as readily as you did.”

“Now what exactly are you implying?”

“You know exactly what I’m implying.” Genji gave him a playful push and ruined his progress out the door.

“Uh, no. I don’t.” He paused in the doorway. “Mind explainin’ yourself there?”

“You did as I asked, Jesse, and more. I asked you to close the rift, and you have. To be honest, I did not expect him to warm up to you as he has.”

“We’ve been over this.” Jesse made it out the door and started down the hall. Genji gave chase.

“Jesse, I know that you-”

“Look Genji, I can see what you’re thinking and I’ma tell you to hold your horses right there.”  

“It’s too late! I’ve lost the horses!” He dramatically mimed losing his grip on some reins and pulled them both to a stop. He went on in his teasing voice. “I noticed you’ve started calling him ‘sweetheart’.”

Jesse’s stomach bottomed out. That had been one development he would’ve been happy for the sharp-eyed ninja to overlook. He’s just glad Hanzo didn’t know him well enough to understand what that meant.

“Shut up.” He grumbled. Genji laughed, but didn’t press it.

* * *

 

He only got three hours worth of sleep before Lena was knocking on his door at midnight to get them on their way. She was the most excited to go, despite the fact that she would be spending the evening waiting for them just to take off again.

“Pssh, none of you knowin’ how to fly means I get to tag along! Have you seen the night market around the tower? I’m going shopping!” She announced via the transport’s intercom. Lúcio and Jesse added Mei to their game of languages to pass the time when sleep evaded them. Winston brought a tablet and his notes to entertain himself.

Lena let them off on the landing pad reserved for Overwatch next to the gardens, overlooked by the blue insignia of Lucheng Interstellar. At Winston’s request, she was shown by a guard to the markets down below. Mei waved goodbye and blushed when Lena quickly paid her lavender dress and matching jacket a compliment. Jesse made a note to text Genji and congratulate him on a job well done.

Winston and Mei were immediately flocked by colleagues that had seen them at this conference or read their work in such journal. Lúcio was equally surrounded. A few official looking people tried to get Jesse to talk about Numbani, but he deflected with stories about the Golden Days instead.

He took to mingling in the crowd, keeping an eye out for suspicious activity out of habit more than actual worry. When the auction started up, Jesse felt his handheld comm buzz in his pocket. He walked to the back of the gathered crowd to pull it out and check who had sent him a message. He blinked in surprise when he saw the name flashing underneath Athena’s logo.

It was Hanzo.

 

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Hanzo Shimada:**

How goes the mission?

**(19:14)**

Why does Athena have you registered as 「Soy Milk」?

**(19:15)**

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Soy Milk:**

cuz wat if soymilk is misunderstood and introducin itself in spanish? lol get it?

well howdy!!! ;)

it aint a mission archer its a party

the partys fine they got these lil hotdog things

**(19:18)**

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Hanzo Shimada:**

An event such as that could also fall victim to an attack.

**(19:22)**

 

Jesse grinned. He fiddled with the personal settings on his contact list and dodged a waiter carrying a platter of hors d'oeuvres on his way out to the edge of the gardens. He lit up once safely away from the fancy crowd, enjoying the view of the city sprawled beneath him.

 

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Soy Milk:**

Awww u worried about me sweetheart?

**(19:24)**

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Archer:**

I regret the decision to speak with you already.

**(19:25)**

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Soy Milk:**

im just messin with u

ill grow on ya. like moss.

**(19:25)**

uuh… did i piss u off or soemthni?

*somethin

**(19:36)**

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Archer:**

Why correct your misspelling if your correction is misspelled as well?

**(19:40)**

 

Bless his heart, the man was even worse in text. Jesse had just gotten used to reading the undertones of the archer’s voice, how was he supposed to know if he went too far without a gruff voice clueing him in? Was the guy teasing or using his lordly tone?

 

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Soy Milk:**

ok this aint fair i cant tell if ur really mad or not :(  

**(19:43)**

 

He didn’t get an answer back. He chalked it up to the time of night, but then realized it was still daytime in Gibraltar. He shrugged and texted Genji to make sure he snuck his brother more pain meds when Angie wasn’t looking. He made sure to add the compliment to Mei’s ensemble.

Lena got them out of China and back to Gibraltar in a record time of just under nine hours. When they touched down, everyone was dead on their feet as they staggered towards the dorms. Lena struggled with her pile of shopping bags. Jesse briefly entertained the idea of going to check up on Hanzo and thank him for the messages (and figure out if he had actually angered him with his assumption) and even made it halfway to the medbay before he remembered the time. His phone read 0238. Angela’d kick his ass for even trying to see a patient that late. He backtracked and made his way through the commons to reach the dorms. The rest had probably already passed out somewhere, and the base was quiet. Not a mouse was scurrying, and not a soul was awake. One of Lena’s bags had escaped her arms and lay forlorn on the white tile of the hallway floor.

It was illuminated by light coming from the open door to the kitchen. A couple steps closer, Jesse heard the sound of someone speaking.

“What in tarnation?” He mumbled as he bent down to pick up the bag. Who was up and eating at this hour? The speaking voice was soft, and he had to strain to hear it.

No, not speaking. Singing. He straightened up too quickly and had to catch his hat before it made a bid for the floor.

He thanked _la virgencita_ for his luck, because he knew that voice. He didn’t know that language, but he knew that voice. [17]

_"Aki no hi, hitori bochi no yoru.”_

He also thanked her for the fact that fancy parties meant he didn’t have his spurs on. He was too tired to manage being quiet in them. Not that he was sneaking up to the kitchen. No, he was walking. Leisurely. Casually. Silent as a mouse so as to not spook a ghost.

_"Kanashimi wa hoshi no kage ni.”_

The clink of ceramic. The hum of the broiler. And a melody that tugged at Jesse’s memory.

_"Kanashimi wa tsuki no kage ni.”_

The bag remained abandoned on the floor and Jesse stepped over it. He knew that song. He knew it, he was sure. It danced just out of reach at the back of his mind and the sudden urgency to figure out where he had heard it before made him forget himself as he crashed into the kitchen.

_"Ue o mui- ”_ [18]

The soft singing stopped just as McCree managed to get eyes on Hanzo, who looked like a deer in headlights clutching a teapot. Steam rose from the rice cooker behind him. He was wearing grey basketball shorts bunched at the lip of his prostheses and a blue muscle shirt. His hair was still down. Jesse yearned to reach out and tuck that errant strand away from his face.

Sleep tugged at the corners of his wide brown eyes.

_Why did he have to be so dang pretty?_

McCree didn’t open with a question about him being released from the medbay. He didn’t think to ask how he was feeling. He didn’t ask if his breathing was okay. If Genji knew he was out.

“What was that? That song?” Jesse’s voice was loud and jarring in the peaceful quiet that had settled before he made his bumbling entrance.

He was met with silence. Silence and a glare he had long since learned to withstand.

“...Would ya keep goin’ if I stepped back outta the room?”

The glare ended when Hanzo closed his eyes wearily and resumed pouring his tea. Ignored.

“Okay…” Carefully, he took two steps out the door and put his back against the wall outside. The beep of the broiler being turned off. A sticky sound. Must be the rice.

_"Ue o muite arukō_. It is an old song, but very iconic. It rose to fame in the first Tokyo Olympics held after the second World War. It would not be out of place had you heard it in a history lesson sometime in your youth.”

McCree took that as permission to re-enter the kitchen. He stopped just a few paces away from the archer. Hanzo was standing by the counter top, hip pressed against the handle of the oven. In his hands was a steaming bowl of rice topped with some stringy black stuff and fish. It smelled good.

Hanzo looked exhausted, he was leaning so the oven could partially take his weight, and his guard had been down enough to allow Jesse to get close enough to hear him singing. Heck, he could tell his guard was down just by the fact he had been singing at all. Jesse wondered if the bullet wound still smarted. He wondered if he was still hopped up on drugs.

The Tokyo Olympics did ring a bell, and Jesse hadn’t paid a lot of attention in school, but he knew that the World Wars had not happened around 2020.

“Naw, that ain’t it.” The memory was insistent. It wanted to be remembered. There was a woman’s voice singing, but he couldn’t hear the words or put his finger on who it was. “I don’t know any Japanese songs. But I know that tune.”

Hanzo didn’t say anything. He ate quietly, eyes never leaving him. Expression closed off, impossible to read anything past how bone-tired he was.

The song looped in his head. It was the kind of memory that dug in deep, loud, determined. It was going to kill Jesse if he didn’t remember.

“What’r’ya doin’ up so late? If you’re out, shouldn’t you be resting?” Jesse settled on asking just to fill the silence. Hanzo chewed slowly and glanced down at his bowl, then back up at him. Jesse could hear the scolding that Hanzo usually wouldn’t mind a mouthful of food to voice. _Don’t ask stupid questions._ More proof of his exhaustion.

“Well I can see that. But it’s a bit past midnight for a snack, ain’t it? Was the medbay grub not up to your standards?”

Hanzo swallowed. McCree followed the motion down his throat with his eyes. He raised his chopsticks. Opened his mouth around another loaded morsel of fish and rice. How he managed to pick out all the little bones with two sticks and fine motor skills dulled down by morphine was beyond Jesse.

“I’ll take that as a yes. But really, sweetheart, you should lie down. You look like a stiff wind would knock ya over.”

Another swallow. Another mouthful. What could maybe be taken as a careless shrug. Amiable as the day they met. Jesse idly wondered if he had been right about pissing him off and decided he wasn’t awake enough to ask.

“Alright. I’ll leave you be.” He turned around and walked out of the kitchen before he did something stupid like relieve the itch that had made itself at home on the tips of his fingers. All he had to do was reach out and touch. Instead, he backed off and tried to keep what he remembered of the tune in his mind. “ _Buenas noches_.”

“ _Oyasumi nasai_.” Hanzo called out after him, the words a bit muffled and awkward around a mouthful of food and a brain fighting off sedatives. Jesse laughed softly. He cut it short when he realized that it was born out of a warmth pooling snug in his chest.

He could see Hanzo in his mind’s eye as he kept his real eyes fixed on the hallway stretching before him. Clad in pajamas, eating real food for the first time in a week, sleep deprivation the only thing that had kept him from saying something rude to Jesse. Scrambling to be polite and call out a good night before McCree made it out of hearing range.  

The laugh trapped in his throat felt a bit too much like… _something_ , for Jesse to let it out in the open. A pain bloomed in his stomach to add to the feeling settling in between the cage of his ribs. McCree told himself to blame Hanzo and his nice smelling food.

* * *

 

It came to him when he was in bed and staring helplessly at his ceiling. Exhausted as he was, catching Hanzo in a rare moment when he was nothing more than just a man was proving to be a mixed blessing.

The alarm clock on his bedside table read 0413.

He didn’t have to close his eyes to hear it. The memory dug in its claws now that Jesse had the clarity of mind to bring it forward. His mother’s voice, rising like the smoke from the tip of her cigarillo. Standing against the pink wash of the sunset, leaning dangerously against the balcony. Jesse doing his homework on the coffee table, wondering if _su apá_ was ever coming back.[19] A doodle on the corner of his multiplication sheet showed an child’s approximation of a uniform-clad retreating back. Jesse liked it. He took out his crayons and began filling it in with green while trying to ignore the soft heartbreak wafting through the sliding glass doors.

_“Te quiero a ti, y nunca seré feliz hasta que vuelvas a mi lado.”_ [20]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was just sitting in my apartment with the tv on, grading some worksheets, when suddenly ue o muite arukou starts playing and i start humming along and i stare at the tv like how???? do i??? know this??? Turns out it’s cuz Selena. Turns out “sukiyaki” was crazy popular. You’ve prolly heard it. 
> 
> AND IF YOU HAVEN’T THEN BOY HOWDY [HERE ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbH754gScuk)[YOU ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTZtxMaByvc)[GO](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IdK0ALLHqfg)
> 
> Translations:
> 
> [1]But spiders always made her run towards him or his father, screaming bloody mary  
> [2]Then the sun chased away the rain (another line of itsy bitsy spider in French)  
> [3]This is not a game  
> [4]Stings, doesn’t it?  
> [5]How pleasing it is to die (tbt chap 1/2 eeeyyyy)  
> [6]basically OMG  
> [7]My brother  
> [8]Fifth of May/May fifth, come on, y'all know this  
> [9]Butterflies! 
> 
> [10]The bros reunion goes like this:  
> Han: Don’t cry.  
> Gen: Big brother.  
> Han: I’m sorry, Genji.  
> Gen: You don’t need to apologize, stupid.  
> Han: Then why are you crying?  
> Gen: Shut up.  
> Han: Okay, okay.
> 
> [11]I’ll give. It wasn’t for me.  
> [12]You’re still here  
> [13] We almost made it too, but the damn crooked guard turned out to be a Muerto and I didn’t have a choice but to-  
> [14]For example, this is my buddy/pardner. Handsome, isn’t he?  
> [15]Stop it  
> [16]If y’all don’t know that oyasumi and noches means goodnight by now I quit  
> [17]Virgin Mary (usually meant as La Guadalupana) 
> 
> [18]The part of the song jesse hears goes:  
> \--those autumn days  
> But I am all alone tonight  
> Sadness lies in the shadow of the stars  
> Sadness lies in the shadow of the moon  
> I look up—
> 
> [19]His dad  
> [20]It’s you I love, and I’ll never be happy until you return to my side
> 
> yo hit me up on tumblr if u wanna, i'm [ cantodelcolibri](https://cantodelcolibri.tumblr.com/)  
> and thanks again for all ur kudos and lovely comments ilu so much


	10. Run It Up the Flagpole

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last week my fifth graders defaced drumf’s face on the local newspaper on the board with various magnets. Soft Japanese schoolchildren rebellion made my day
> 
> See end notes for translations, hover over for urdu/hànzì/kanji, blah blah blah

_“Ue o muite arukō, namida ga kobore nai yō ni.”_

It wasn’t sadness that he felt. What he was experiencing went beyond that.

 _“Nakinagara aruku, hitori bochi no yoru.”_ Hanzo sang, even as he chided himself for his own melodramatics. He cursed when inattentiveness caused water to slosh over the edge of the sink he was standing before, soaking his shirt. He was alone. McCree left, and Hanzo washed his dishes while he finished the song interrupted by the less than welcome intruder. [1]

 

Intruder. A fitting nickname. Along with cowboy, gunslinger, _rōnin,_ fool, liar, stupid, _ahō-_

 

Hanzo stopped. Took a breath. He put up his dishes and stalked back to his bedroom.

 

What he was experiencing felt like defeat.

 

In the safety and familiarity of the solitude of his room, Hanzo allowed the scene to replay in his head.

 _‘You did as I asked, Jesse, and more.’_ Genji repeated the conversation overheard two nights prior while Hanzo yanked off his shirt and sat at his bed to remove the carbon fiber plating on his legs. McCree had closed a rift, offered a smile, laughed with him, and made Hanzo feel welcome. _Wanted._ For being nothing other than himself.

Or so he had thought.

 _‘I did not expect him to warm up to you as he has.’_ Hanzo didn’t bother to put away his things before falling backwards onto the covers. His brother could never keep himself from meddling. Seeing Genji and the cowboy together, hearing the familiarity they shared, the easy jokes brought on by reminiscence... Hanzo could easily see how McCree had hung his tail between his legs, swallowed his ire, and done Genji’s bidding in the aftermath of their disastrous first meeting.

Hanzo drifted in a state of half-sleep. Genji spoke, and the image his mind conjured was of a green haired man, clad in the orange of their family’s colors. His mouth spread in a careless grin. _‘Now that he has you.’_

Genji was wrong. He didn’t _have_ anyone. Much less that foolish cowboy that he had risked his…

No. He hadn’t done it for him. He hadn’t. It was the truth. He had done it of his own free will for the good of the world, for the sake of the mission. To make the right choice for once in his life.

He stared at the dappled white tile of the ceiling. The alarm clock on his bedside table read 0413.

What else had he been enjoying at the goodwill of his brother? Perhaps he deserved this. Something as simple and fulfilling as friendship was something that a murderer didn’t deserve.

 

No.

 

No. Irksome as he was, he had Genji. Mei, Lúcio, and Lena were genuine in their kindness. It wasn’t home, they weren’t family, but he had a place here. He had spent enough time wallowing in self-hatred, becoming lost in the roar of the dragons’ rage and the bottomless ocean of his despair. He had become lost when he sacrificed his heart for the sake of the family. Lost when he wandered for a decade, trying to atone, and when Genji found him and offered forgiveness.

He had spent too long adrift and unsure of himself and his place in this world. He refused to have a foolish cowboy and his idea of pity ruin his progress.

_‘My life’s yours.’_

_“Kutabare.”_ he muttered. Sleep finally took him. [2]

* * *

 

“-ent Hanzo? Agent Hanzo? Ah, you’re awake. Agent Mercy requests your presence in the medbay. You are late to your checkup.” Athena’s voice startled him awake. She politely informed him that it was 1032 before he could even lift his head off his pillow. He was late by two minutes, but sleep was too tempting. He resolutely folded the pillow over his ears to avoid the reality of the day going on outside his bedroom door.

“Agent Hanzo?” Athena was muffled by memory foam. The good doctor deserved punctuality. Hanzo knew that, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. He fell back asleep.

A knock roused him some time later. The memory foam couldn’t save him from the insistent _don don don_ of whoever it was that required him. Oversleeping had left him with a headache and an unpleasant taste in his mouth. He sat up and cast a bleary look around the inside of his room. Decent enough. He swung his legs off the side of his bed and stepped over the discarded plates of his modifications on his way to answer the door.

The metal fist knocking froze before making contact with his face when the door was opened. He looked up and saw crinkled smiling brown eyes.

 _“Buenas, dormilón!_ Angie sent me to make sure you’re alright. Athena reported you as bein’, uh…” He watched those eyes drift from his face and wander south. He remembered his shirt was at the foot of his bed. “As… bein’ ‘uncooperative’.” [3]

His eyes went lower still, then stopped, then blinked. “I thought they were prosthetics.”

Hanzo fought the urge to hide himself behind the door. Did the man not have even an ounce of tact? In a second, the overheard conversation returned to the forefront of his mind, and he remembered their encounter the night before. His temper flared.

“They’re not.” He said curtly. The tone didn’t escape McCree. He looked back up with a question in his eyes.

“You wake up on the wrong side of the bed, darlin’?”

“Please inform Dr. Ziegler that I am truly sorry I missed my appointment. The pain medication she prescribed left me with little energy to do more than sleep. Now, if you have no further need of me-” He made to close the door. Metal fingers kept it open.

“Now wait, wait, wait! Hold on a dang minute!” McCree frowned down at him, “You feelin’ alright, sweetheart?”

“Yes.”

McCree huffed, unconvinced. “Then why’re ya bein’ such a pepper?”  

“What?”

“Grouch.” he translated.

Hanzo bristled. He pried his hand off of the door and tried to slam it again, but the hand returned and held it open. “See, like that! You’re angry at me, ain’t ya? What’d I do now that made you regress to stern and taciturn?”

Hanzo growled, “Perhaps your complete disregard for my right to privacy is what irks me, McCree.”

He immediately withdrew his hand from the door. “Sorry. I’m sorry.” His chipper mood from before was gone. “Is this about that text? Sweetheart, I was just screwin’ with you.”

_Ah yes, screwing with him._

“Do not call me that.” he barked just as Lúcio opened the door next to his and waved at them both merrily before going his way. McCree waited until he turned the corner before rounding on him.

“Fine. Archer, then. Be honest with me, what’s this about?”

“Be honest with you?” He said. He registered his voice was getting louder. “Hypocrite! What honesty do I owe you when you have been false from the start?”

“Wuh?” The bastard had the gall to look confused.

“I heard your conversation with Genji the night you departed for Lijiang. There is no need for you to continue this farce, McCree. I have no need for your pity!” he spat. McCree gaped, and then his eyes widened in realisation.

“Aw, bless your heart, is that all? Sweetheart, when I met you I was ready to shoot your pretty head clean off! You can’t blame your brother for pulling me aside and orderin’ me to lay off and make up for actin’ like an ass! You can’t stand there and tell me that you ain’t glad I cleaned up my act and played nice. It got us here!”

 _Played nice._ The idiot gave himself away without thinking. “And where is here, exactly?”

“Here as in friends, archer. _Amigos_. And don’t you hide behind your language barrier again, I know you understand me.”

“A decision you made.” He ground out. “I was never consulted.”

If he had actually raised a hand against McCree, it wouldn’t have earned him such a slapped look. Hurt was quickly overshadowed by disbelief and followed by anger. “Naw. Naw Shimada-san. I ain’t buyin’ your shit. Either you’re tellin’ the truth and I’ve been worth shit-all to you all along, or you’re lyin’ to save face.”

 _To save face._ So he had been right. That was the only confirmation he needed. “We’re done here, McCree.” he said cooly. Giving up the door as a lost cause, he stepped back to put space between them. McCree followed unthinkingly.

“Like hell we ain’t! Listen, Genji only said that ‘cau-” He stopped in shock when Hanzo shoved him out of his room with a hand against his chest.

“I do not care. I am done speaking to y-” McCree cut him off by pushing his hand away and stepping pointedly back out into the hallway.

“Goddamn, Genji only felt he needed to ask me that because he was worried about you! ‘Cause he cares about you! He loves you, alright? Don’t fuckin’ see why, after what you did to him-” McCree clamped his mouth shut and swallowed audibly the second the words left his mouth. He backtracked desperately, “That was outta line. I’m sorry, Shimada-san, you know I don’t mean nothin’ by it.”

 _“Iwanakute ī yo.”_ [4] His attempt to shut the door again was thwarted by the same metal hand.

“Wait, Shimada-san!” McCree’s eyes were pleading.

“We are done here.”

“No we’re not!” At Hanzo’s murderous glare he raised both hands. “Alright, fine. Sorry, but this ain’t about that. Angie sent me ‘cause you weren’t answerin’ and somethin’s come up. Winston got a call from Numbani’s mayor. They’re gonna have a ceremony to give us some shiny plaque and a big tour of the city. Should take all week. Winston asked Angie if you’re good to go, and she’s leavin’ it up to you so… Do you wanna? Go, I mean?”

“No. Please convey my apologies to Numbani’s officials, and Winston as well. Goodbye.” he took advantage of McCree’s contrite posture and finally closed the door in his face.

The next day, Lena flew off with McCree and Zenyatta. Hanzo watched them go from the cliff atop which he had been trying to mediate. Search as he might, clarity refused him.

 _‘My life’s yours.’_ The dragons pulled up the memory of McCree’s voice and wrapped around it possessively. But Hanzo didn’t want it, especially not it if had been a promise borne from a sense of guilt and a lie.

He gave up meditating and idled until his appointment with the doctor. She signed him off as fully recovered and cleared him for use of the training ranges. Relieved, he went and practiced for an hour before the pointed silence of the range made him miss the cowboy’s damned conversation. He gave up to seek out Mei in the labs. Neither she nor Winston were there, but he arrived just in time to see an apple flash out of existence atop the architech’s desk and reappear from a device in the shape of a flower planted by the entrance to Hanzo’s right.

It rolled towards his feet. Vaswani looked up to follow the journey of her test subject and found him curiously looking at her experiment. Taking up her entire desk was an identical sleek white device, with a short spout atop glowing blue. She folded her hands on her lap and regarded him quietly. Head tilted slightly to the side with her long dark hair draped over her shoulder, expression a bit curious. A bit uncertain, a bit uncomfortable, a bit unapproachable. A bit like him.

He opened his mouth to ask after Mei, “How does that work?” came out instead.

* * *

 

Geneva made contact again, and Winston called them all into the briefing room at the end of the week to go over a new mission to England.

“The bomb threat was vague, but Athena has narrowed down a possible travel route for the terrorists. An EMP bomb of that size would do the most damage in London’s Underworld, densely populated with omnics and their sympathizers.”

As he sat and listened, Hanzo felt his communicator buzz in his pocket. Satya glanced over at him when the fifth occurrence continued to go unanswered. He knew it would be McCree without even having to look. The man had sent him messages with increasing frequency since their argument in the hallway.

“I’ve contacted Lena, and she’s flying the Numbani group back early today to prepare for the mission and fly the team out in two days. They’re set to arrive in four hours. The UN has assigned Agents Tracer, Lúcio, Symmetra, Mercy, Torbjörn, and Reinhardt to this mission. You’ll be split into two teams. Lúcio will be support for Tracer and Symmetra in King’s Row. Mercy, your team is down in the Underworld.”

Satya let out a little noise of disgust at the prospect of being on the same mission as Lúcio. The audiomedic picked it up, seated at Hanzo’s other side, and glared at her. “Got a problem with me, Vishkar?”

She gave a derisive scoff. “To think I would have to work with a street ruffian.”

“Satya.” He warned in a whisper. Mei, seated to her left, hovered a hand over her thigh.

Lúcio frowned. “I'm not all that excited about this arrangement either.” he turned to Winston, “Can’t I switch with Angie?”

“Geneva picks the teams, not me.” he said.

“This is why Commander Reyes disapproved of the UN’s direct influence. They are politicians, not generals.” Genji commented from across the room. Torbjörn loudly agreed.

“Oh, not this again.” Dr. Ziegler sighed next to him. Genji turned to address her.

“You know McCree would agree with me too.”

“Okay, that’s enough. We can’t and we won’t fight the UN on this. Don’t bite the hand that feeds you, as the saying goes. Those of you whose names I just called stay in here. The rest; dismissed.”

Hanzo bid Satya farewell, and she returned a cool nod. Mei latched onto him when they filed out, but they were intercepted by Genji before they made it back to the lab.

“ _Onī-chan_ , can you explain to me why McCree is under the impression that I must _‘straighten him out, Genji-kun, ‘cause the fool won’t listen to me’_?” Genji gave an American southern accent a valiant attempt, and failed spectacularly. Of course the cowboy would have turned to Genji for backing. Mei looked between them curiously, then excused herself quietly and fled the scene. His phone felt heavy in his pocket, but he resisted the urge to look. After having time to reflect on their argument, he knew that he hadn’t given McCree a chance to defend or explain himself. He knew his reaction had mostly been borne by a bad mood and slight withdrawal from the pain medication. He knew that if he read his messages, his anger would either dissipate or be fueled. He wanted neither, and so he was intent on ignoring the pseudo problem until it went away. His phone buzzed again.

It wasn’t going away.   

Genji stared pointedly at his pocket before motioning to the doors. “Let’s take this outside.”

They took up their usual spot atop the cliffs overlooking the sea. Both settled into lotus position across from each other. Seagulls landed near them, hoping for the treats that Genji and Zenyatta (and sometimes Hanzo) brought them, and gave disappointed cries upon finding none. “So? What is this about?” Genji asked.

Irritation rose. Why would they not leave him be? “Did you ask him to befriend me?”

“Yeah. So what?” He admitted it readily, carelessly. It only served to incense Hanzo.

“So what? So this entire time, our interactions have been false! He only started forcing himself to talk to me at your behest. Everything that came afterward was falsehood!” He fell back on the old argument, what he told himself should shame and disgust him.

“What does it matter?” Genji cut through it all.

“It matters to me! It matter because this is a-” He stopped the word from coming out of his mouth, fully aware of whom he was speaking to.

Betrayal. It was betrayal, to lead him on with easy smiles and hushed jokes. _Amigos._ And if it was only that, then he supposed the betrayal he felt was disproportionate to the reality of their interactions. Hanzo had been hesitant to call the man a friend, but he thought their hard-won camaraderie to be genuine, not forced by an ill-made promise. Yet McCree had wasted no time in falling back into his old hate the second Hanzo stopped playing his game. That was proof, surely, that Hanzo had been nothing but a chore to him. It had to be.

“What does it matter why he started? Didn’t I ask the same of you?” asked Genji.

“I only promised civility.” Hanzo grumbled, trying to drown out his own thoughts.

“What? No, sorry. This doesn’t make any sense! I thought you liked him.” Genji confessed. He ignored Hanzo’s alarmed look and went on, “You joke around him!” he pointed accusingly. “Hell, once I swear I saw you smile! I know you, brother, and I know this isn’t about what I told him. Why are you behaving this way?”

“I may have… overreacted.” Hanzo allowed, if only to distract Genji from the reaching the point he knew he was on course for.

“Yes, I am well aware of how fond you are of your theatrics.” Genji teased, and Hanzo thought he had succeeded, but Genji went on, “But this is different. He said you yelled, _nī-chan_. You’re going to scare him away if you keep this up. Dramatic as you are, you never raise your voice _like that_ unless…” Understanding dawned in Genji’s tone. “Unless… this reaction is owed to something else.”

Hanzo was quickly coming to personally realize the conclusion Genji had already reached. Genji took off his mask to look his brother in the eye. Hanzo didn’t even flinch. He was too busy thinking of his restlessness while McCree had been away on the mission to Lijiang. How he had stressed over his safety, the chances he would get shot clean through the head without Hanzo and the dragons there to protect him. Putting one’s own life at risk for another had unfortunate aftereffects. If McCree’s life had been enough for Hanzo to tempt death once, then subsequent scenes were sure to follow. He was attached, for better or for worse. Hanzo decided on worse.

 _He hadn’t done it for him._ He kept having to remind himself of that. He hadn’t. He knew, but the fact didn’t feel important when Hanzo’s motivation then had resulted in Jesse McCree being alive now.

_‘My life’s yours.’_

A short sound of static. “....Hanzo.”

He kept quiet, but Genji could never help but meddle. _“Hanzo. Makkurī ga suki?”_ [5]

He scoffed at the very idea. “Don’t be absurd.”

Genji didn’t buy his dissent. Voice gleeful, he asked, _"Boku no iu tōri darou!?”_ [6]

_“Sore wa kesshite arienai.”_ [7]

“The part where I’m right, or the part where you like him?” Genji leaned back, abandoning his meditative posture.

After some deliberation, Hanzo settled on, “Both,” and didn’t speak despite Genji’s prodding. When he gave up, they meditated until they spotted Lena flying in as a dot on the darkening horizon.

* * *

 

For the first time in more than a month, Hanzo did not attend dinner that night. Or the next night, or the night after that. Genji would have a thing or two to say about his behavior, if the hurt and apologetic looks the newly returned cowboy sent his way were anything to go by. But his messages stopped, as did the talking, and the joking, and the laughter.

He wasn’t isolating himself. Time was spent in the labs with Mei and Satya. Genji and Zenyatta were decent company in the early hours of the morning, Lúcio stopped any and all passersby to get a second opinion on his work. The two days leading up to the departure of the King’s Row team were full of noise and activity.

It still felt like silence. But Hanzo preferred the silence to the twisting in his stomach whenever he thought about seeking the gunslinger out to apologize and clear the air.

The floodlights were on and turned down to frame the transport in a golden glow between light evening showers. While Lena ran last minute checks, the Overwatch agents gathered outside to see their teammates off.

“This is nice,” he overheard Winston remark to Athena on his tablet, “Back in the old days, there were so many of us that no one really knew where anyone was. This sort of thing never happened.”

Reinhardt flourished his hammer as he marched onto the transport. Torbjörn trailed behind him, lugging a huge crate full of parts for his mobile turrets with Dr. Ziegler’s help. Lúcio quickly skated past Hanzo and Genji, face at odds with the jovial tune coming from his Crossfade suit. The explanation walked up calmly in her cyan blue tunic and heels, a shield of hard light kept her dry.

“Was he running from you?” he asked curiously.

“We had a disagreement in the hallway leading here.” she replied dryly. Hanzo shook his head, but didn’t comment. Genji wandered off when he saw Mei and Zenyatta appear through the bay doors, tugging the umbrella out of Hanzo’s grip as he went. Hanzo let him, the rain had let up for the moment. He offered it to Mei and his master, and Mei looked over to them and sent them a big wave. Satya returned the gesture with a small one of her own, but took advantage of her distance to mutter to Hanzo, “Please be sure Mei-Ling calibrates the sensors every night. She has a tendency to lose herself in her work, and I do not want to return to erroneous data.”

It was Hanzo’s turn to wave, “I would remind you that I offered to do so myself, but you would again bring up my lack of certified qualifications.”

“Apologies that I do not find a Bachelor's degree in physics to be on par with a Doctorate in engineering. At least Mei-Ling has some background knowledge in my field.”

Hanzo wasn’t insulted. In fact, he was charmed and more than a bit amused. He opened his mouth to retort, but she beat him to his point.   

“Neither does a Master’s in geometry. And your business degree is of no consequence here.”

He was about to point out that a diploma wasn’t necessary to press a couple of buttons when he heard the sound of spurs behind him. His face must have given him away, because Satya cast a glance behind them. She made a thoughtful noise.

“I will take my leave.” She nodded graciously and stepped back to join her team on the transport. _“Phir milengeh, Hanzo.”_

 _“Mata ne, Satya.”_ [8] No sooner had she disappeared into the belly of the transport that the gunslinger spoke up.

“Since when’re you ‘n’ her on friendly terms?”

“What do you want, cowboy?” He turned to look at him, regretting the decision instantly. What did the man have against utilizing all the buttons on his shirt? Again, his forearms were stained with motor oil, and sweat glistened on his brow beneath his hat in the humidity of the rainy night.

“You called her ‘Satya’.” McCree accused.

“That is what she asked to be called.” Hanzo turned back around to avoid looking at him and to watch the transport take off.

McCree’s affronted reaction was almost drowned by the sound of its departure. “What she asked--! Okay. Alright. Listen, can we talk?”

“Make it quick” Hanzo pointedly looked away when McCree came into his field of vision, pleading eyes, pouting lips, half-undone shirt and all.

“Please, Shimada-san. I’m tryin’ to do right by you. Genji-kun said-”

Hanzo’s stomach dropped.

“-that I should talk to ya, and I told him I was tryin’ to give you some space but… Look, I-”

“McCree,” he sighed tiredly. He felt a few drops of rain land on his shoulder.

“No, listen Shimada-san, I didn’t do it for him!” He said with such desperate earnesty that Hanzo had to hold back a flinch of guilt. He swept the hat off his head despite the now falling rain and held it to his breast. “I didn’t! Maybe it started that way, but honest to God archer, I wouldn’ta kept at it if I didn’t actually like ya! Look, I’m sorry for what I said, throwin’ your past in your face like that. I was hurt and bein’ ugly to get back at ya. You didn’t deserve it.”

“I did deserve it.”

McCree stopped. He searched Hanzo’s face and seemed surprised to find a lack of the animosity thrown at him days before in the dorm hallway. “Look,” he said hesitantly, “I meant what I said, back in that medbay. Whether you like it or not, you saved me, and I owe ya. My li-”

“I already told you that I did not do it for you.” He cut him off hurriedly, but it felt like a lie even when it wasn’t. He felt the dragons rising hungrily at the unfinished sentence, voltaic beneath his skin. Possessive creatures. What did that say about him?

“And I already told you I don’t care why you did it! If having my life means you’ll have nothing to do with it, then just say the word and I’m gone, archer. Sorry. Shimada-san. Sorry.” He corrected quickly.

An unnamed feeling rose to choke at Hanzo’s throat. He was tired of becoming lost in his anger and losing out on good things for the sake of pride. He had spent too long letting honor rule his life, his decisions and emotions. Remnants of the Shimada-gumi. The dragons didn’t care for such trivial human affairs. This was all Hanzo’s doing, and he was _tired._ “No.”

“No?” McCree repeated.

Hanzo shook his head. He gestured to the shelter of the warehouse and led the way towards it. Once tucked away from the rain, Hanzo held out his right hand and offered it to McCree. McCree stared down at it nonplussed.

“I did deserve it. I let old fears and insecurities cloud my judgement, and was not fair to you. Genji asked much the same thing of me all those months ago. And I, same as you, merely offered civility until it became apparent that you weren’t… entirely insufferable.”

“High praise, darlin’.” McCree drawled with a quickly growing smile. Hanzo wished he would stop.

“Furthermore,” Hanzo brandished his hand again, “I suggest we forget Genji and his meddling and begin anew.”

The grin on McCree’s face widened to its fullest extent, laughter lines evident. He wiped his hand on his pants, streaking the wet denim black. He clasped their hands. “Well, if we’re turnin’ a new leaf, you ’n’ me, then...” Hanzo tried to take back his hand, but McCree held fast. “I just got one lil’ thing to add.”

“What?” He looked up with narrowed eyes.

McCree winked at him and released his hand. Hanzo frowned when he saw traces of oil on his palm and glove. “Call me Jesse.”

Hanzo opened his mouth to protest out of habit, to claim cultural differences, but doing so felt like letting McCree win their long-standing disagreement. They were starting over, and ‘Jesse’ was what he was asking to be called. Hanzo crossed his arms and shifted his weight to consider the man before him. “If I am to call you Jesse, then you can no longer hide behind your excuse of a Japanese _faux-pas_.”

McCree gave a chuckle that could only be classified as shy. “Alright. What’ll it be? Hanzo-san or Hanzo-kun?”

Hanzo wrinkled his nose at both options. “Neither. Just Hanzo.”

* * *

 

The bomb threat in London that garnered the UN’s involvement turned out to be a hoax. At least, that’s what the headlines ran with when the day of the threat came and went.

The team in King’s Row remained on alert. With no sign of the EMP bomb, the mission fell to recon. The agents dispersed to gather information on known terrorist movement within the city. Winston and Athena kept everyone in Gibraltar updated over breakfast.

With only six of them on base, Winston joined them for team practice sessions. McCree took over maintenance of Torbjörn’s turrets and joined in when Winston began communications with Helix Security and the UN regarding August’s new recruit. Mei took on Satya’s experiments as well as her own and made adjustments to the base’s air conditioning system. Zenyatta tried his hand at cooking, to surprisingly undisastrous results. Hanzo and Genji succumbed to a bout of nostalgia in a quest to clean the entirety of the base and see who was the quickest to fly down the floors of the halls with a wet rag.

Mei and McCree found them in the evening lying in a heap at the end of the dorm hallway, Genji’s exhaust vents overworked, and Hanzo panting with one of the soiled cloths draped over his flushed face. He showered while they sent a comm message to Zenyatta to meet them in the rec room. When he walked in tugging on the left side of his _gi,_ he found everyone already settled in to watch Mei’s Korean drama.

“Saved you a seat!” Genji called. Hanzo took the center spot between him and Mei, and McCree pressed play. When midnight rolled around, Zenyatta suggested they go to bed, but everyone shushed him with a plea that there were only three episodes left. When two in the morning came, Mei was snoring on Hanzo’s shoulder and McCree was loudly complaining that there was no way the protagonists were siblings and didn’t know until then.

At 0300, Athena’s blue logo interrupted their stream. “Agents.” she began, tone serious, “Winston has asked me to wake you. I have received news from England.”

Hanzo nudged Mei, and Genji hurled a throw pillow at McCree.

“Is something amiss, Athena?” Zenyatta asked.

“The team at King’s Row was successful. They secured the EMP bomb and delivered it to the British authorities. It never reached the Underworld, but Agent Tracer’s group suffered heavy casualties in attacking it. Agent Mercy has taxed her Caduceus technology to keep Agent Lúcio alive.”

They fell into a horrified silence.

“Is he okay?” Mei asked shrilly. She stood up hastily and rushed out the door, followed by the rest of them, and they all fell into Winston’s lab. “Is Lúcio okay?” Mei asked again, once they laid eyes on their commander.

Winston looked as if he had just been roused from sleep himself. His armor was missing its white shell in places, and Hanzo wondered if he slept in his under armor. His screens were set to footage from London traffic cams. A blue light flashed from end to end, following a figure swinging between buildings. One of the smaller screens was zoomed in on the pulsing blue of Satya’s transporter, through which appeared its architech and a bloodied audio medic wrapped in a photon shield under heavy fire from the rooftops. Lúcio skated forward and activated his sound barrier just as a couple of civilians fell back to cower under enemy fire, and Mercy landed to treat their wounds. Satya followed, loosing energy balls from the petals of her projector. She ran offscreen and Mercy flew away while Lúcio ushered the boys to safety.   

The second the waves radiating from his Crossfade suit lessened to their usual beat, the scenes on the various cameras came together. Satya rounded a corner and began to set up one of her sentry turrets to replace one of Torbjörn’s. Lena burst into life over the payload, and was immediately tethered by Mercy. Reinhardt covered an injured Torbjörn as he built another turret, and all their movement distracted from the figure slinking atop one of the balconies.    

“He’s fine. He will be fine.” Winston said as they watched Lúcio get shot on the left side of his chest. Winston said it in a tone that suggested he was trying to convince himself as much as Mei. He spoke over the sight of Mercy cutting off her tether and flying in a golden streak past Lena, who blinked atop the roof as a venom mine was shot onto a faded brick wall. “McCree, I need you to go down to the basement levels and prepare one of the holding cells.”

“We expectin’ company?”

“Lena won this round. She managed to knock the Widowmaker into one of her own traps.” He said parallel to what they watched onscreen. “We need to up security. Talon will not take this sitting down. I need everyone on high alert. Zenyatta, can you go prep the medbay?”

“Yes.” He answered, and was gone. McCree lingered.

“Is preparing a cell the only thing you’re asking me to do here, Commander?” he asked quietly, a strange look in his eyes as he watched Widowmaker drop from a roof, then get swept up by Tracer.

“We need information.” Winston said plaintively. “Amélie is innocent, McCree. But Widowmaker is a Talon creation. She will be loyal. We need information.” He repeated the last part in a whisper. “Only as a last resort, do you understand?”

McCree nodded, face grim and serious. “Yessir.” And he was gone as well.

“Agents Hanzo and Genji, please run a perimeter check and make sure all of my drones are active. Report any weak spots.” Athena lit up on her white stand at the worktable. “Winston, I am working to reactivate the shields we used against the press.”

“Thank you, Athena.”

The transport touched down just as the sun cleared the horizon. Zenyatta and Genji rushed forward when the walkway lowered. Mercy greeted them with a few whispered requests. Genji carried Lúcio’s equipment away. Zenyatta and Mercy wheeled their patient to the medbay. Torbjörn and Reinhardt followed, the former tense and angry-looking, the latter infinitely sad. Between them were two thin figures, one clad in her familiar orange tights and an unfamiliar grimace, the other with her head covered in black. Lena had one of her pistols out and trained on their prisoner as they guided her down and off the transport.

McCree tensed next to Hanzo. “Amélie.”

Hanzo wouldn’t have recognized his almost-killer even if she didn’t have the hood. He saw a lithe figure, only a scant few inches taller than Tracer. The Widowmaker was dressed in a skin-tight purple suit with a dramatic neckline that left very little to the imagination. Her skin was tinged a ghastly blue. She would seem a reanimated corpse if not for the fluid way she moved, graceful despite her lack of vision and cuffed wrists. Lena pulled her to a stop in front of their gathered group, hand wrapped tight around the sniper’s tattooed forearm. The barrel of her pistol pressed against her bare back, at the center of a spider design.  

“Whose idea?” McCree gestured at the cloth that spilled down over the Widowmaker’s thin shoulders.

“Mine.” Lena snarled, voice and face twisted and angry like Hanzo had never heard before. Mei winced.

“Lena-” She tried, but Lena shook her head. She stared up and met McCree’s concerned look head-on.

“Where am I taking her?” she asked. McCree reached past Hanzo to pat Mei comfortingly on the head before leading Lena and her bodyguards away.

Last off the transport was Satya, who took on the job of powering down the transport and closing its door. Mei gave her a small wave, which she returned tiredly. “I do not have time to talk.” She said, walking right past them, “I must report to my superiors at Vishkar.”

Mei and Hanzo were left alone outside. Mei dragged in a deep breath to calm herself. She gathered Snowball in her arms and looked up at Hanzo. “Do you want to help me make breakfast for everyone?”

He watched Satya disappear through a doorway deep within the Watchpoint, face a terrible blank and lips moving rapidly. He nodded.

* * *

 

The Widowmaker refused to speak. Every time Hanzo happened to see McCree in the hallways or at the occasional dinner, he looked haggard, haunted, and exhausted.

Winston set up a watch rotation. Hanzo sacrificed sleep to sit up with Mei when a night shift fell on her. She persisted that it wasn’t necessary, but her relief and gratitude was obvious. He didn’t question the reason behind the tension in her shoulders when she read her name on the roster pinned to the bulletin board next to the 0230 slot. He merely sat beside her at a balcony overlooking the lights of Gibraltar and kept vigil with Storm Bow at his side.

Lúcio was in recovery. Dr. Ziegler’s quick response and his own music saved him from much of the suffering Hanzo had gone through. But getting shot so close to the heart had brought on a different set of complications. His physical therapy took longer and threatened to leech the joy out of him, but Lúcio had always been a fighter. A smile lit up his face whenever he got a visitor, and he received a constant stream of them. Hanzo made himself one on a quiet afternoon.

“Yo, Solo! Nice to see you, neighbor! You miss me yet?”

“There is a certain advantage to no longer having to suffer through your noise at five in the morning when you wake up feeling inspired.” Hanzo said, but he kept his voice light. Lúcio clicked his tongue.

“It ain’t noise! It’s music! Nah, it’s science!”

“Loud science.” Hanzo sniffed.

“Hey! At least I don’t make anything explode!”

Before he could quip about the state of his eardrums, Lena appeared and bumped into him from behind.

“Oof! Sorry love, fudged the landing there!” She said, “Winston wants you down in the interrogation rooms, Mr. Shimada.”

“What for?” He asked. Lúcio waved them off and Lena led him down a flight of stairs tucked away from the main part of the Watchpoint while she chattered about McCree’s progress with the Widowmaker. She pushed a big lead door open, and Hanzo’s eyes latched onto Genji, standing next to Winston and leaning against the black glass of a two way mirror. Everything was stainless steel and bleak, the processed air had the scent of disinfectant.

“Ah, _onī-san_.” He walked over to wrap a hand around his shoulder. “When was the last time you had contact with the family?”

“When I left. Why?” He let himself be steered forward and placed in front of the window looking in on McCree and their captive. McCree had a hard look on his face, expression blank to match the one of his charge. Amélie Lacroix stared impassively at him from her seat behind a metal table.

“Because she is under the impression you may be interested in rejoining them.” Winston answered.

That took Hanzo aback. “What?”

Lena leaned over to press a button by the side of the room’s door, “McCree, we’ve got ‘em. We good to come in?”

“Yeah.” His voice came through filtered and static through a speaker. “Alright Miss Amélie, you said you’d talk if I brought them here,” his voice cleared when they opened the door and Lena ushered the Shimadas in before herself. “So talk.”

Her hazel eyes zeroed in on Hanzo. He glared down at her as the door clicked shut behind them.  

“Gabriel’s pet dog was one thing. Ziegler’s pet project was another. How low has Overwatch fallen to recruit the likes of you, _monsieur?”_

“Hey, you’re talkin’ to me, Amélie, not him.” McCree shifted in his seat to cover Hanzo. He responded by dropping a hand on his shoulder to warn him off.

“Tracer said you requested our presence?” he asked.

She hummed, and a smile twisted her lips. Her eyes raked what they could of him. “Your set of morals is as well suited to Overwatch’s ideals as the dog’s.” She jutted her chin in McCree’s direction. He didn’t react, so Hanzo followed his example.

“She said Talon’s looking to strike a deal with your old folks. Weapons. Their faction in the UK were the ones that smuggled in that bomb. Miss Amélie here was there to make sure Talon’s investment paid off. Athena just got back to me with a confirmation that there’s activity out in Hanamura. You got any insight?”

“I have not had any dealings with the Shimada-gumi since I renounced my claim to them.”

“She seems to think otherwise.” McCree said, but his voice held no suspicion. He was looking up at Hanzo with his head tilted back and hat resting against his chest.

“You cannot renounce claim to your birthright, _Shimada-dono._ ” Her accent curved to allow for the honorific. “Talon wants to deal with a Shimada, not greedy old men grasping at power.” She eyed his tattoo. Genji fidgeted at his side.  

“How do we know she is not lying?” Hanzo asked as his mind ran through the news.

Widowmaker laughed, short and indulgent. _“Croix de bois, croix de fer, si je mens, je vais en enfer!” [9] _ 

“That’s how.” Lena pointed. “Cross my heart and hope to die.”

“Talon has had their eye on the Shimada for years. It fell to shambles in your absence.” Widowmaker went on. “You kept your empire well little lord, don’t look so surprised. I am sure Talon would have you take it as a compliment, even after you insulted them when you refused to deal. But they are generous. They will afford you a second chance.”

“What?” His patience was wearing thin, but around him, Overwatch’s senior field agents shifted restlessly.

McCree twisted in his seat, held out an arm to Genji and started to explain, “Look sweetheart, now don’t be gettin’ angry. It has to do with-”

“I will get angry if I so choose to.” Hanzo already felt his temper rising at being the only one left out of the loop.

“Ah. It wasn’t you?” Widowmaker said, and Hanzo’s blood went cold.

 _“Anīja.”_ Genji said urgently.

“I suppose that does explain why Overwatch approached that one instead.” she nodded at Genji, then raised an eyebrow at Hanzo’s shell-shocked expression. “You didn’t know? Why did you think you were dispatched to kill him so suddenly? What else did your elders not see fit to tell you, _Shimada-dono_?”

Hanzo blanked as too many things fell into place. Genji’s behavior, how his dismissal of his duties had cost them many a lucrative opportunity that Hanzo had resented him for. Genji, young and idealistic, selfish and thoughtless, tossed aside a deal that Hanzo then would have taken up in an instant to please the elders and increase profits. He cast a look to his brother. His mask betrayed nothing.

If it hadn’t been for Genji, whose deaths would Hanzo have indirectly been the cause of? He looked to Lena, then down to McCree. His life before had never coincided with Overwatch. He ran too tight a ship for the UN to get a foothold on their movements across the globe. The Shimada-gumi were ruthless and good at what they did. Any ally of theirs met their goals. Talon would have gained an upper hand with Hanzo’s family at its prime. A decision then to put Genji in charge of preliminary dealings had resulted in the safety of the lives of the people Hanzo could now call friends.

Lena chose that moment to cut in and ask, “Why talk now Amélie? It’s been days.”

She shrugged. McCree whispered something about apathy. “Do what you will with what I’ve given you. They know not to expect me to keep their secrets, hence why they do not give me any. But no one sees the spider spinning its web in a corner.”

“They underestimate you?” Lena asked, bewildered.

“They care that their marks go down. They see the rifle.” Her voice held the barest trace of disgust, “They see my face, my body, my history. I am passive by their making and my own.” She cocked an eyebrow at their stunned looks. “Passive, but sentient. _Je suis vivant._ That, they don’t see.” [10]

“You.” She directed her sharp gaze at Hanzo. “You are not happy here.” She smiled, deceptively sweet. “ _Pauvre prince_ , why not go back to your kingdom? With you at the throne, Talon could restore your family’s empire.” [11]

Her words cast him back into a merciless ocean. Hanzo didn’t take his eyes off his brother when he answered. “But at what cost?”

Genji gave him an understanding nod, then walked out of the room. McCree tried to keep the Widowmaker talking, but whatever had brought upon her loose tongue had left the room along with his brother. Lena pulled him out, and they were joined by McCree a few minutes later.

“We’ll take the rest from here, loves. Go rest up.” Lena spoke softly. McCree offered her a thanks and pushed an unresponsive Hanzo back up to the ground floor of the Watchpoint. Hanzo made to break away and head for his room, but McCree stopped him with a gloved hand around his wrist.

“You alright there, pardner?”

“This has given me much to think about. I must deliberate alone on how to move forward. Overwatch must lead an investigation in Japan. It is only fitting that I begin to form an appeal to send to Geneva to aid Winston in the process.”  

McCree dropped his wrist and smacked his lips. “Naw, time alone to brood and kick yourself over ‘mighta been’s’ is the last thing you need. What you need is to get outta that head of yours for a spell. Come on, I’ll call Genji back, get Zen to leave his perch on the roof. You can get Mei to pull up another drama on her watchlist.”

Hanzo scowled. “I do not brood.” He turned and continued down the hall through the commons. The sound of spurs followed him. “I will not waste time when there is work to be done. This is my family, McCree. If the Shimada-gumi has risen again, I will strike them down.” The last part came out in a snarl. He fought back bile when his hand felt the phantom grip of his sword.

“The problem’ll still be here tomorrow.” McCree insisted softly, “And tomorrow we’ll have clearer heads to tackle it. Sweetheart, stop. You’re shaking.”

He was. He hadn’t realized it. His head was buzzing, the memory of grief woke the dragons from their slumber, the fear of an alternate universe where Watchpoint Gibraltar was haunted by ghosts was a storm in his mind. He felt large hands turn him gently. He looked up and saw eyes lit the color of honey, like a lifeline thrown as he drowned. He fixated.

“Hey Genji-kun. Round up Mei and Zenyatta, would ya? Uh huh.” McCree had a finger to his ear as he pulled Hanzo into the empty rec room, “Yeah, yeah, I got ‘im. Me? Well I hope you ain’t got nothin’ against _novelas,_ ‘cause that’s all I got loaded up.”

Genji didn’t mention the interrogation room when he appeared flanked by his master and their climatologist. A sweaty, vodka wielding Mei playfully shoved Hanzo right into McCree to claim the center seat directly below the air vent. When Genji and Zenyatta sat to her left, Hanzo was quickly reminded of what a tight fit five made on the brown couch.  

McCree pressed play. Mei passed around her bottle. Hanzo had a hard time concentrating on the screen. It was some sort of soap opera set in a lavish house with a grand spiraling staircase. English subtitles ran along the bottom of the screen to match the Spanish spoken by the actors.

“See those two?” McCree pointed at the two women on the screen and then singled one out. “That’s Marissa, the short one. She’s a sweetheart, nicest person in the damn house which also means she gets the most shit.” Hanzo tried to ground himself in his voice when metal fingers passed the neck of a glass bottle into his hand.

“She’s cute.” Genji threw out. Mei agreed. Hanzo pushed aside childish thoughts about indirect kisses and took a swig.

“The tall angry one with the fashion sense is Jose Maria.” McCree went on to explain how they were friends, but had recently started fighting over Carlos, a new hire to Maria’s father’s cartel. Everyone ignored the comment on Jose Maria’s fashion sense. She wore a red plaid shirt tied at the front to show her midriff, jeans with a big belt buckle with a horseshoe on it, and a stetson.

It quickly became apparent that Jose Maria was in the throes of a panic once she realized that her obsession with Carlos revolved around the fact that Marissa liked him and she was jealous. The drama spiraled into half-comedy, half-suspense as she tried to woo Marissa and save her from Carlos’ influence at the same time.

They watched, commenting often and loudly, English littered with Japanese phrases that all but one seated on the couch understood. As episodes passed, Hanzo grew invested in the story, and the shadow cast by the reemergence of the Shimada-gumi fell away. They watched a flashback to when the main protagonists met, and the actress for Jose Maria made it obvious that she had known she was lost since the beginning.

 _"Koi no yokan.”_ Hanzo muttered. Zenyatta nodded. Mei agreed with a dreamy sigh, but Genji called them dramatic. [12]

They ate popcorn instead of dinner. They watched Maria push Marissa farther and farther away with her badly concealed clinginess and lazy flirting. Hanzo felt a certain sympathy for Marissa. _“Maria ga oseji o ieba iu hodo, masumasu ore wa kanojo ga iya ni naru.”_ he said.

 _"Usotsuki. Kanojo to Makkurī wa uri futatsu da.”_ Genji was quick to call him out.

 _"Uso ja nai."_ Hanzo defended himself. But the tension of the day had fallen away, and Genji went back to teasing.

_“Kanojo ga suki! Nazenara, Makkurī ga suki!”_

_“Urusai.”_ He aimed a drunken kick at his brother’s legs over Mei’s lap, and just missed. [13]

McCree was left on the sidelines, unable to follow. “Mind keepin’ the discourse in English, please?”

“Sorry.” Chanted Hanzo, Genji, Mei, and Zenyatta. Mei passed the bottle back to Hanzo, who drank from it readily, too far gone to complain about the lack of a glass.

Hanzo went on in their shared tongue. “Marissa is not superficial. If Maria does not stop the flattery, she will lose what little goodwill she has gained. _Da kara, kanojo ni wa kanojo no kokoro o itomeru mikomi wanaidarou."_ he lapsed back into Japanese. He handed the bottle to McCree, who took it while leveling him with a glare for leaving him out of a conversation about his own show. He took a drink and handed it back. [14]

“Are you still talking about Marissa or...?” Mei tried to keep McCree in the loop, her face red from the drink and tendrils of hair escaped from her bun.

 _"Kare jishin."_ Genji replied. Mei snorted loudly, Hanzo inhaled the drink he had just taken. Zenyatta voiced his agreement. McCree, thankfully, understood nothing. _Bless his heart. [15] _

_“Vayanse a la chingada!”_ McCree threw a pillow that managed to hit both Hanzo and Mei in the face before it stopped against Genji’s shoulder. Hanzo elbowed him in the side, and got himself pinned by a metal arm for his troubles. He pulled his arm free and settled back against McCree’s warm bulk. [16]

Genji and Zenyatta excused themselves around the time Mei slackened against Hanzo, fast asleep. McCree bid them good night as he muted the show. His boots _thumped_ against the coffee table’s top, and Hanzo rested his own feet on McCree’s shins when they failed to reach the ledge of the pushed-off table. Mei was drooling on his bare shoulder. He looked down on her fondly. McCree passed him the last sip of vodka. All was quiet.  

“Hey, archer?” The breath carried by the nickname ghosted across the top of Hanzo’s head.

Hanzo tipped his head slightly back to look up, the drink causing his vision to spin for a second, “What?” He caught the moment McCree ceased to look at him and turned away to watch the tv.

“The other day, when I went to wake you up and… well. I wanted to say sorry. If my comment ‘bout your legs was insensitive.”

“I minded then. I do not mind now. There’s no need to apologize.”

“Oh. Uh, then… you don’t mind my askin’?”

He gave a small shake of his head. His eyes flicked down to where his ankles were crossed over on top of McCree’s shins. His spurs glinted in the light the screen provided.

“...What happened to your legs, sweetheart?”

Hanzo considered his answer. Slowly, he asked, “What happened to Genji?”

“Ah.”

The girls rode away together on horseback towards the sunset. A happy ending. The screen faded to the credits. “What happened to your arm?”

McCree took the limb in question and draped it behind Hanzo’s head along the back of the couch. He flexed the fingers as he looked at it, contemplative. “Decided it was worth tradin’ in to save the life of my commander.”  

“Dr. Ziegler must have had her opinions on that.” Hanzo said tersely, bidding the swell of rage and fear and panic that had risen at his admission and the go-lucky sentiment behind it.

“Genji tore me a new one for her. Shouldn’t have, the yellin’ I got from her was bad enough to put my ma to shame. Neither held a candle to Gabe though.” McCree gave a small smile that fell away slowly. Hanzo felt metal fingers graze his forehead as his hand pulled back a lock of his hair and tucked it back behind his ear. “What’s with the stinkface?”

“It is just my face.” Hanzo reminded him.

His smile reappeared. “That it is.”

Whispered words hovered in their bubble of the recreation room. McCree spoke about the golden days of Overwatch. He talked about a bright young med student that landed a job as head of surgery, about a proud woman that cared after strays with her watchful tattooed eye. He spun a tale about a knight and his armorer, a woman of golden hair and dark skin who ‘took no shit.’ He made a human out of the blond man immortalized on UN propaganda, called him _Jack_ with a tone that belied a tense relationship. And then he spoke of Blackwatch and Commander Gabriel Reyes.

“Gabe’s the one that-” He said, and Mei shifted and mumbled in her sleep. He fell silent. Hanzo blinked away sleep from his eyes. The arm he was pressed against shook with silent laughter. He stood, dislodging Hanzo and he froze to keep the movement from waking Mei. “It’s late. Let’s leave her the couch.”

Hanzo was loathe to stand and leave the comfortable haze he had fallen into, but he let McCree maneuver Mei off of him. He stood and reached for the remote to turn off the tv, and McCree unwrapped his _sarape_ to drape it over Mei. Hanzo’s mind reminded him of the time it had been stained a deeper red with his blood, when he heard a frantic voice urging him to keep his eyes open. Now, they threatened to close. He was half asleep on his feet, in a state of half-consciousness at the result of too much to drink. He wasn’t in control of the path his thoughts took. A metal arm guided him out of the rec room door and towards the dorms. His right side remembered pain, his ears registered that McCree was talking again, mentioning something about an early morning and a request to put in to Winston. Traitorously, the dragons slid against his skin, lulled by his smooth tenor.

He hadn’t done it for him. _He hadn’t done it for him._ That much held true. But in the aftermath, Hanzo was forced to step back and examine what his actions had sown. As much as Hanzo wanted to wash his hands of the whole ordeal and move on, the cowboy and the dragons wouldn’t let him.

 _My life’s yours._ McCree’s casually thrown words tolled in his head like a bell, and the dragons latched onto his implication all too readily. They were creatures of hunger. And they hungered.

Dragons shared that trait with humanity. And Hanzo was just a man.

“Aaaand I’ve lost you again, haven’t I?” McCree was saying. He laughed, and it was warm. He laughed so easily, so readily, unaware of the turmoil the sound of his bared soul wrought on Hanzo’s dwindling sense of self preservation. “You look half-asleep on your feet there, archer. Y’need me to carry you to bed before you fall on your face?”

_‘My life’s yours.’_

He didn’t want his life. He could keep it. Hanzo didn’t want anything to do with it. He just wanted-

He stopped in his tracks, pulling McCree with him, the jolt ringing the silent hallway with the sound of spurs. “Uh, sweethea-”

McCree’s back was pressed to the wall before the last of the endearment fell from his lips. Hanzo’s fist was closed around flannel and pressed against the feel of a suddenly racing heartbeat.

“Hanzo?” Jesse breathed, arms hanging uselessly at his side. Hanzo looked up to meet his wide startled eyes.

 

He was _tired_.

 

He smoothed out plaid fabric and let his hand travel up to grasp at coarse hair at the back of a tanned neck. McCree gulped, his tongue flashed out to swipe at his bottom lip. Hanzo’s pulse felt erratic, electric. Ready to shoot out of him if he let go of his composure, do as the dragons bid and simply _take-_

 

He just wanted-

 

McCree’s hands went up to tentatively frame his hips just as a scream came from the room they had just abandoned. Hanzo’s head cleared at once, and he and McCree scrambled back just in time to catch Mei as she stumbled over the couch and reached for them.

“Mei!? What’s wrong?” he asked anxiously, pulling at the _sarape_ to check for wounds, wishing he had Storm Bow.

“I, I thought I was… that it…” She was hard to understand past the wracking sobs that shook her body. She fought to put on a brave face and gave them a shaky smile. “I’m sorry. It was just a… a dream. A bad dream. Sorry.” She took in their shocked expressions and her smile faltered. “I’m sorry!” Her voice went up an octave when her apology ended in a wail and she slid to the ground.  
  
“Mei.” Hanzo kneeled down, remembering her mention of Antarctica and waking up alone. They had been foolish to leave her. She lunged forward, her arms wrapped around his shoulders and she cried into the crook of his neck. The metal of her glasses dug into muscle.  
  
“You were gone!” She managed in between hiccups. “I woke up and they were gone! Torres, Opara, Arrhenius, everyone...” She clung to him, digging her fingers in the meat of his arm.  
  
“Should I call someone?” whispered Jesse, who had knelt down next to them. “Mei, honey, who do you need? Lena? Angela?”  
  
“No! Don’t leave! Don’t leave, please.” She unwrapped an arm from Hanzo and used it to pull Jesse towards her by the front of his shirt. He wrapped one arm around her while the other fell in a neutral position on Hanzo’s lower back.

“Aw, sweetness, I was just gonna use the comm. I wouldn’t dream of leavin’ you.” He consoled her.

Mei shook her head through her tears and Hanzo lifted her up by the waist. “It’s late, Mei. Let us take you to your room.”

She shrank in on herself on the walk to the dorms. Her arms were wrapped tight around her middle, and she whispered nonsense about having powered off Snowball in the labs. She barely managed to punch in the passcode to her room, and she asked them to please wait while she changed into pajamas. They lingered outside her closed door awkwardly, gazes refusing to meet after whatever had transpired in the hallways outside the rec room. Jesse startled when Mei’s door slid open, mouth half-open as if about to speak up. She pulled them both inside her room.

It was cluttered, in the way of someone very organized but also very sentimental. Stuffed toys sat next to extra parts for Snowball, snowglobes served as bookends for old fashioned files and binders. She sat at the edge of her bed and wrung her hands in her lap. She bit her lip and looked up.

“Stay? _Qǐng nǐ?”_ Her voice small and anguished and pleading. As if she believed Hanzo would leave her in a moment such as this. [17]

He pulled up her desk chair and pushed her softly until she fell back on her soft purple pillows. “What do you need of me?”

“I… I don’t want to get lost again. In my head. Sometimes, when I remember, I forget where I am, and… it takes a while to come back. I play audiobooks, or music, or just… noise. I just need noise. I can’t stand the quiet.”

Hanzo hummed. He ran his fingers through Mei’s soft brown hair in a manner he remembered his mother doing for him and Genji to chase away bad dreams. It felt nothing like McCree’s. With a jolt, he remembered and cast a quick look at the cowboy at Mei’s other side. He would have to think of an explanation for his actions. Maybe he would blame the alcohol, lie and blame fatigue. They didn’t have the luxury of dealing with the unnamed thing between them with the dangers they were about to face. His and Lúcio’s injuries were proof that life in Overwatch could be cut short at any minute. There was no room for distractions.

But as he watched a kneeling Jesse make shushing noises while casting a reassuring smile down at their teammate and friend, Hanzo’s heart made the decision for him.

 _"Mukashi mukashi…"_ He began. Mei sighed in relief, catching on to what he was giving her. _“Aru yama ni toshioita ookami ga sundeimashita.”_ [18]

It seemed that he was fated to become lost after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hanzo’s story here cuz i didn’t feel like givin y’all two paragraphs of japanese: There’s a tale that back when there were wolves in Japan, they acted as sorta two-faced watchers of the mountain path. If you were lost and tripped, the wolf would pounce and devour you. But if you were lost and maintained your cool, you could ask it for help and it would guide you home. Nice guy mountain wolf.
> 
> Japan had a 6.9 magnitude earthquake this morning off the northeastern coast. The teacher's office has got the tv set to NHK and it seems like nothing too terrible has happened, but pls join me in sending positive thoughts their way. 
> 
>  
> 
> [1]This part of the song goes:  
> I look up as I walk so that the tears won't fall  
> They well up as I walk, for tonight I'm all alone  
> [2]Fuck that/to hell with that  
> [3]Mornin’ sleepyhead!  
> [4]Save your breath.  
> [5]Hanzo, do you like McCree?  
> [6]I’m right, aren’t I?  
> [7]That’ll be a cold day in hell./That’s impossible.  
> [8]See you, Hanzo. Later, Satya.  
> [9]Wooden cross, iron cross, if I lie, I go to hell! (As i understand it, the French equivalent to ‘cross my heart and hope to die’  
> [10]I am alive.  
> [11]Poor prince  
> [12]The feeling, upon meeting someone for the first time, that you are fated to be together. Love at first sight type deal, but not necessarily romantic.  
> [13]And the novela commentary goes as such:  
> Han: The more Maria flatters, the less I like her. (lies, Hanzo)  
> Gen: Liar. She and McCree are like two melons (peas in a pod)  
> Han: I’m not lying.  
> Gen: You like her! Because you like McCree!  
> Han: Shut up.  
> [14]Then she will have no chance of winning her heart.  
> [15](He’s talking about) himself.  
> [16]Y’all go to hell!  
> [17]Please?  
> [18]Once upon a time, there lived an old wolf on a mountain.
> 
> yo hit me up on tumblr if u wanna, i'm [ cantodelcolibri](https://cantodelcolibri.tumblr.com/)  
> and thanks again for all ur kudos and lovely comments ilu so much


	11. Shikata Nai

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I figure this makes more sense in the beginning notes: When Jesse starts singing, if you don’t recognize the song, for the love of god, [LISTEN](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Knp1pwuDLTU)
> 
> And thank you [WhiteNoize33666](http://archiveofourown.org/users/WhiteNoize33666/pseuds/WhiteNoize33666) for putting up with me from the other side of the world. I would propose marriage, but you already turned me down gently.
> 
> See end notes for translations there’s a shitton i’m so sorry also hover over on pc for kanji

Good news came to Watchpoint Gibraltar in the form of a gunmetal gray Helix Security International transport on the first weekend of August. Jesse watched it land through the wide windows of Angela’s office as he held out a fan of bobby pins for her to take as she fixed her hair. 

“C’mon Angie, you look beautiful. Not a day past thirty, which ain’t fair by the way. We’re the same age, how come it’s you that gets to look like a movie star?” he asked, and she plucked a pin from his fingers to hold back a few flyaway hairs. 

“The secret is hydration, moisturizing, exercise, and not smoking.” She chided as she frowned at her reflection on a computer screen. She nodded, put away her things, and led the way out of the medbay. “Perhaps you can start with the fourth step.” 

“I’ve been cuttin’ back.” He pouted as they cut across a catwalk. He sped up to straighten the collar on Angela’s lab coat. 

“Cutting back is not quitting.” She reached up to bat his hands away. A set of doors slid open at their approach and they walked through the wider expanse of the warehouse. 

Jesse let out a puff of air as the wide open bay doors came into view. Fareeha could be seen surrounded by Overwatch’s agents. Her mouth was stretched in a happy smile, the gold beads in her hair flashed when she threw her head back and laughed at something Reinhardt was saying as he wheeled off a huge crate stamped  _ PHARAH _ . Behind them were the retreating backs of her Helix chaperones as they reboarded and took off. Fareeha would be for Helix what Satya was for Vishkar. Another set of eyes for the UN meant to keep their little organization in check to stave off repetitions of past mistakes. But Faree had a history with Overwatch, and had already proven she was partial to their plight. He wasn’t too worried.

He could hear introductions on top of hearty welcomes. Fareeha seemed to be making rounds, and when she reached Mei and Satya, the latter stiffened tellingly. He watched as Mei shot Satya with a knowing glance when the architech’s eyes widened and darted frantically over Fareeha’s uniformed figure. He gave a low whistle, “Doc, y’should get a move on ropin’ in your lovely lady before someone beats you to it.”

“She’s not my ‘lovely lady’.” Angela said woefully, eyes on the same interaction. 

“It’s only a matter of when you decide to giddy up, Angie.” he said, just to press her buttons.  

“Are you in any position to judge me, cowboy?” She grinned and stopped him with an outstretched arm. “Have you roped someone in yet? A certain  _ sweetheart  _ of yours, perhaps?” Fareeha looked up and caught sight of them, and her face lit up in joy. She excused herself and walked over.

“I’m workin’ on it.” He shrugged, determined not to let his gaze wander in search of an absent yellow scarf. “Faree!” He waved cheerfully and Fareeha took her eyes off of Angela to glare at him after giving him a once-over. She changed course slightly and stomped over to him with a grim expression, and McCree’s smile widened. 

“What is that?” she asked through bared teeth from a few steps away. McCree lowered what he realized was his mechanical arm. 

“Ah, heh, well I uh… I’da thought your mom woulda told you about…” 

“No not that, you self-sacrificing moron.” She only stopped when they stood toe to toe, and Jesse took a moment to proudly realize how grown she looked. “That… that!” She gestured to all of him in the little space between them. He looked down at himself. Then back up at her with an innocently questioning look. “I hoped it was for the mission! Who let you go full cowboy? Angela!” She turned her fierce look on Angie, who smiled.

“You should have seen the beard on him at recall. I took a trimmer to his face the next day.”

“I’ll have you know I worked hard to achieve that level of travel-worn and rugged!” Jesse said, hurt.

Fareeha gave him a final judging look before she stepped sideways to crush Angela in a hug. “Hello! Thank you for helping me with Numbani!” 

“Fareeha! I almost got you fired!” Angela cast Jesse a wide eyed pleading look over a broad, muscled shoulder as her face lit up pink. He waggled his brows at her, and Fareeha tightened her hug. Like mother like daughter, and Ana had always been touchy and affectionate beneath the tough exterior. 

“No you didn’t. You got me here. You know, it’s funny.” She cast a wistful look at the shiny outer walls of the Watchpoint. “I always dreamed of being stationed here. And here I am.” 

“Yes you are.” Angela’s complexion calmed and she put space between them to look up at her warmly, “Your mother always hoped you’d follow in her footsteps.” 

The smile on Fareeha’s face faltered for a fraction of a second, but it was back when she tore her eyes from the Watchpoint and back down at her. “She did?” she said lightly, “Funny, she never mentioned that to me.”  

“Maybe not necessarily in joining Overwatch,” Angela winced, and Jesse felt likewise. They both remembered the arguments, and Fareeha’s final decision that if Ana would put up every roadblock to keep her from joining Overwatch, then she would enlist in the military instead. He had been the one to drive her to the airport. Ana hadn’t spoken to him for a week. “But you have worked hard to make the world a better place, just as she did.” 

“C’mon  _ hermanita _ , let’s get your things to your room. It’s right next to Angie’s.” [1]Jesse cupped her dark head and pulled her towards him, then planted a kiss at her temple. She huffed about not being a child, but let him pull her to the dorms to drop off her bags. They gave the commons a cursory glance, but Jesse had noticed that their commander had been absent from the welcoming committee. He directed them past empty offices, thinking that if his internal calendar was in order and today was when they heard back from Geneva regarding Hanamura, then that would put Winston in the labs awaiting information with- 

“Ah, McCree. I was about to put in a request for Athena to find you.” said Hanzo with his back turned to the entrance to the labs, no doubt alerted of their presence by their footsteps and his spurs. He was sitting on the edge of Winston’s tire and typing away at his keyboard while Athena pulled up maps and news clippings. 

“Jesse,” Jesse reminded him. He had been half-right. Winston was nowhere in sight.

Hanzo cast him a tired look, but muttered a quiet, distracted, “Yes, Jesse.” nonetheless. “The UN has granted us permission to investigate in Hanamura. Winston has gone to requisition supplies. I would like your opinion on something.” 

“Yeah?” He unwound his arm from Fareeha’s shoulders and went to stand next to him. The close proximity brought attention to the dull ache in his stomach that had made itself a happy home ever since the damned night they returned from Lijiang. Said ache had only been fueled by the night Hanzo had shoved him up against the wall with sparking eyes that promised a hell of a lot of nice things, but any attempt at bringing that particular topic up was a surefire way to make sure the archer fled or deflected. He’d been more than a bit drunk, and McCree had the good grace to admit it wasn’t in good taste to pursue the subject. He was a gentleman, after all.

“They took our personnel request well. You, Genji, and I have been assigned.” Hanzo paused, stood, and directed a shallow bow in Fareeha’s direction. “Hello, I assume you are Fareeha Amari. I am Shimada Hanzo. I apologize for not being outside to receive you.”  

“That’s fine.” she said, and he nodded. Then he whipped back around to resume typing. 

“They also assigned Mei, Zenyatta, and Satya to the mission. There seems to be a lapse in communication between the UN and Vishkar, because the dates they gave us coincide with a business trip of Satya’s. I will have to send them a message to let them know of her unavailability. I thought perhaps it would be a good idea to provide a suggestion as well. Perhaps Lena? That way the trip can be worthwhile for her.” 

“Naw, she’s wound too tight with our guest downstairs.” The UN had granted them temporary custody of Amélie Lacroix until they could figure out how to process a woman who was technically a brainwashed POW. Athena monitored her closely in the cells. “She’ll wanna stay on base with Winston.” 

“Can I come?” Fareeha draped herself like a cat over Jesse’s left shoulder to peer at the information on the screen. “I can pilot instead.”

Hanzo gave her a hard look. She stiffened against him and took a step back. The ache in his stomach glowed soft and warm, looking down at Hanzo mean mugging her. “Y’know, it ain’t a terrible idea. The UN already knows she’s qualified. They’d probably be up for it.” 

“She’s new.” Hanzo said, “The mission is next week. That is not enough time for me to prepare new group formations and attack plans.” 

“So let me do it. Heck, let her do it! We’re hazing you, Faree. To stay in, you hafta lead a successful mission against the yakuza.” 

“Oh goodie.” She said dryly. 

“Jesse, don’t joke.” Angie spoke up.

“McCree.” Hanzo warned. Jesse raised an eyebrow at him.

“Jesse.” he reminded, “Look, hold off on your email for half a day. We’ve got team practice in two hours. You’ll see her in action, and you’ll see I’m right and write her name in to replace your architech.” He tried not to let his lingering jealousy leak into his voice, “Trust me on this, sweetheart.”

Fareeha’s eyes widened and she smacked at Angela’s arm excitedly. Jesse pointedly ignored when they fell into rushed whispers directly behind him. 

* * *

 

Hanzo went off with Winston to write up their reply to Geneva following a very lively practice session in which Pharah showed off her Raptora Mark VI suit. The grumpy ninja had been begrudgingly impressed by a neat rocket trick that leveled the makeshift town in Range Two. Jesse, Reinhardt, and a fully recovered Lúcio went over to claim the kitchen while Angela kept Fareeha distracted. Reinhardt squeezed into the freezer room to hunt down cream and eggs for the cake he was baking just as Lena wandered in. Jesse offered her a spoon covered in cookie batter.

She took it with a smile that didn’t match its usual vigor. “Thanks love. What’s all this for?”

“The cookies? A welcome party! The spoon? You looked like you could use some cheering.”

She sighed, unhappy to be caught, “Sorry, it’s just… I’ve just been feeling a bit pants, is all.” She sighed and leaned against the freezer room door. “But a party, yeah? That’ll be fun! We doublin’ up to cover Ms.Vaswani too?”  

“Mei said she’ll try to get her to come, but I’m not holdin’ my breath.” Lúcio said with a look that suggested he had just taken a whiff of something rotten.

Reinhardt opened the freezer door and sent Lena tumbling onto the floor. She rewinded to save her cookie dough.

That evening, the food and a decent amount of booze was demolished in less than an hour. Satya showed up pulled along by Mei and Winston. The equally reluctant Hanzo was pulled in by his brother. They mingled and chatted, Fareeha met the remainder of the agents. By popular demand, the welcome party became a karaoke night. The lights were dimmed, and Lúcio appeared with a microphone and tablet accessing Athena’s extensive song selection. 

The first one up was Fareeha, who was ordered to sing an ancient song by The Weather Girls to the hooting and hollering members of Overwatch. She stood atop a makeshift platform that Satya created in exchange for having herself and Hanzo removed from the performance list. The tv was set up to show the words for the spectators, with a holo in front for the singer. 

Whenever the song called for Fareeha to sing, ‘men!’ Jesse led those gathered on the couch or on chairs set up around battered tables in shouting out “JUSTICE!” instead. 

“I’m going to kill you,  _ akh!”  _ She ran at him the second her song was over.[2] He sidestepped and hid behind Angela, who pivoted and betrayed him by letting Fareeha bowl him and his whiskey sour over on top of the Shimada brothers innocently seated on a bench behind them.  

He was promptly shoved onto the ground, where Fareeha kept him with a knee on his chest and a hand ruffling his hair viciously. 

“Uncle! Unc-” He broke off into laughter when her fingers abandoned his head and dug into his belly instead. 

“That’s payback for all the noogies you gave me!” she shoved his hat back on and rose to her feet. Torbjörn handed her the tablet to take his turn. She pulled up one of Lúcio’s songs and wandered off, then Genji pulled him up to sit between him and his brother as Torbjörn climbed onstage. McCree downed an abandoned vodka tonic at their table when he began paying too much attention to Hanzo’s throat as he drank from his gourd. 

“It’s been too long since we’ve done this.” McCree reminisced while Genji poured him a new shot of something alarmingly blue. “Remember, Genji-kun? Torbjörn would be a dick and start giving people songs in Swedish, and it’d all go downhill from there.”

“It went downhill the second he started singing, you mean.”

“I heard that!” Torbjörn called from the stage, where he had just finished his song. 

“Why, that is a most splendid idea! Go on, my diminutive friend! Do your worst! HA HA! I will be sure to pay you back tenfold!” Reinhardt, who lingered by the stage to take his turn as Athena’s list demanded, said in a bombastic voice. 

“Well with a music taste like yours, I don’t doubt it.” Torbjörn groused. 

Reinhardt pretended to be offended, and Torbjörn delivered. Soon, they were all trying not to cover their ears at the sound of the big man crooning ABBA. In between all the mangled Swedish, Lena appeared at their table offering rum and a drunken history lesson on Eurovision. In the middle of the lecture, Genji rose for his turn and groaned when Reinhardt put on Night Rocker. McCree nursed the rum bottle Lena left behind when she stumbled away. Hanzo watched his brother act the diva while sipping from his gourd, and Jesse nudged at his shoulder.

“This’s a party, archer. Would it kill ya to crack a smile?” McCree clinked his bottle against the gourd. He felt good, warm, and there was a buzzing beneath his skin. 

Hanzo set his gourd down on the table, “My time would be better spent preparing for our upcoming mission. Winston has entrusted me with command of the operation. Wasting time on frivolity is-” 

“Shhh, shhh.” The buzzing fell in a concentrated pool on his fingertips. Jesse leaned heavily to the right and put a clumsy finger to the archer’s parted lips. Hanzo froze, and Jesse happily switched his finger for his thumb and ran it across his full bottom lip. Then his hand was slapped away, and Hanzo scooted away a few inches.

“You’re drunk.” He told him, a note of accusation in his voice. 

“No I ain’t.” He tried to pull up a mental tally of how many drinks he’d already had, but the numbers didn’t end up adding up. On the stage, Genji was only slightly merciful to Lena. A dancing blue-haired anime character winked behind her on the screen as she struggled to sing in Japanese. Reinhardt was dancing along at the foot of the stage. 

“You say that Overwatch would often have nights such as this?” he asked just as Genji sat down at his other side and distributed bottles of beer. 

“Often is an understatement. Any mission considered the slightest success was awarded with drinking and dancing.” said the cyborg. 

“Your tales of your former commanders make it hard to believe that nights like these were the norm.” Hanzo had to lean in close to be heard over the noise. Jesse could smell the sake on his breath. He could feel the warmth of his bare shoulder against his arm, thigh pressed against thigh. He pushed away his beer. His stomach wasn’t built to endure this brand of torture. 

“Aw, I mostly complain about ‘em, ‘specially Jack. You’re missin’ the other side o’ things. Gabe an’ me would play the guitar. Angela’d play the piano.”

Angela took the mic from Lena, and they were graced with a pitchy cover of a popular love ballad. 

“You play the guitar?” asked Hanzo just as blue popped into existence across their table. 

“Oh no, don’t you go givin’ him ideas!” Lena interrupted to wag a finger at him. “He’d serenade anyone walkin’ past ‘im and give chase whenever they didn’t stop to listen. Him and Reyes both. A right sight, both of ‘em were, croonin’ almost as if it were a threat.” 

“Y’all just don’t appreciate the finer points o’ romance.” 

Lena snorted. “Harassment, more like.”

“I remember that!” Winston and Lúcio stopped by their corner. “You were always after Morrison the worst. Or Reyes was, and you just followed his example. What did Reyes always call it? A senerado…?”

“ _ Serenata _ . Gabe sang and I played, and Jack would alternate givin’ me the stinkeye and givin’ him mooneyes.” Good old times.[3]

“Wait wait wait. You’re talkin’ about Jack Morrison, right? Head honcho?  _ The  _ Jack Morrison? He did karaoke nights?” Lúcio asked, mixing a soda bottle with the abandoned rum, and the senior agents barked in laughter. Hanzo leaned into him to get a full view of the entire table. Jesse reached over to steal Lúcio’s rum and coke.  

“Jack? Pssh, naw. He couldn’t carry a tune if he had a bucket with a lid on it. Not for lack of tryin’, mind you. Specially if Gabe or Ana got any tequila in him.” To Lúcio’s left, Angie sat down in an exhausted heap and handed Lúcio the mic. She flicked through what Athena had to offer for Lúcio’s turn. McCree glanced up and confirmed that he went after. 

“I just picked the first thing I saw in Portuguese, I’m sorry.” Angela lamented. Lúcio bounced to the stage, loudly reassuring that anything was better than Hasselhoff, and that he couldn’t even sing anyway.

“I’m a DJ!” He exclaimed, and the screen behind him lit up with the first lines of his song. “Oh shit! Doc, is this what I think it is?” He gave a delighted laugh, “Aw man, this is a classic! Damn!  _ Minha avó  _ used to listen to this! Do we have Luan Santana too?!”[4]

Jesse redirected his attention to the archer slouched half on top of him. As much as he enjoyed being used as a body pillow, his arm was losing feeling. Genji was watching them quietly with his legs crossed on top of the table, head tilted. He had that knowing look of his beneath the mask, Jesse would put money on it. 

_ “Nossa, nossa, assim você me mata.”  _ Lúcio sang.

“Hey sweetheart, you mind movin’ just a sec? Can’t feel my arm, and I’ve gotta be able to hold a mic real soon.”

Hanzo grumbled, his head lolled up to cast him a resentful look at the mere suggestion. But he did move, and he slumped against the wall to settle for watching Lúcio perform. 

When drunk, the skin at the sides of his eyes flushed a delicate red, the effect ended up looking more like makeup than the blotchy blush across Jesse’s own cheeks. It was... cute, and alluring at the same time. He looked like some kind of spirit plucked from a painting of feudal Japan. Half-dressed in a stormy  _ gi, _ the gold of his scarf draped over his naked shoulder. Half-lidded eyes weighed down by the alcohol and a dark fan of lashes. Jesse couldn’t look away.  

_ “Ai se eu te pego, ai ai se eu te pego.”[5] _

And Lúcio cheerfully singing a love song in the background that McCree could halfway understand wasn’t making matters any better. He took a huge swallow of beer even though his stomach hated him for it.

“You’re killin’ me here, sweetheart.” he whispered, and Genji snorted.  Next to him, Lúcio sat down, shining bright like the star he was after his stellar performance. He was handed the tablet after he handed McCree the mic. 

Lúcio grinned. “Oh, I’ve been waitin’ for this!” There was a gleam in his eye that automatically set Jesse on high alert. “Man, do I have a song for you!”

“Lulu, if you make me sing reggae-”

“Nah, Cash, I wouldn’t do ya like that. Ha! I wouldn’t do reggae like that!” Lúcio pressed play. 

Jesse heard the the slow strumming of a  _ bajo sexto _ for a few calming seconds as all heads in the room immediately turned to him. Then the sound of fiddles rushed it into a more jovial tune. He groaned, then laughed and pulled his hat over his face. 

“You’re dead to me, Santos.” The music swelled and then flew right in for the words. He had to run onstage pumping one fist in the air to sing along.

_ “Cruzando la frontera me encontré con él, era un tipo medio raro pero me cayo bien-”  _

“You gotta do the dance too, Woody!” Lúcio hooted, raising an arm and spilling beer all over himself, not that he seemed to mind. Jesse flipped him the bird as he pushed his bottle into Fareeha’s hands and began the two-step dance.

_ “Me dijo con certeza que no hay mas emoción, que romper un sombrero-”  _ One hand on his belt buckle, the other around the mic. Two steps to the right.

Genji pawed at Hanzo until he could pull his brother’s phone from his pocket and began recording. Jesse flashed him his most winning smile.  _ “Les digo ven, ven, ven, animalito ven, ven y sígueme y veras lo que vas a aprender-”  _

Two steps to the left. The phone was shoved into Hanzo’s hands when Genji was lifted up and out of his seat by an enthusiastic Lena. 

Two steps behind. Reinhardt was already mimicking the dance on the cleared floor in front of their makeshift stage, causing the nearby tables to shake. 

Two steps to the front. Angela and Fareeha were a giggling mess next to the knight, tripping over each other. 

A quarter turn. Satya eyed the dance curiously and stood up to perform it with more grace than Jesse could ever hope to achieve. 

Two steps to the right. Torbjörn spilled ale on his beard and cursed as he tried to sop it up with a rag offered to him by Winston. Mei yanked a drunkenly crying Lúcio to join in. 

_ “Lo peligroso es gracioso, lo difícil es hermoso-”  _ Two steps to the left. And Hanzo-

Hanzo was laughing. Head thrown back, arm wrapped around his middle, whole body shaking. In his hand he held the phone. The video would probably be an awful mess, but Jesse made a note to have Genji send it to him if only to hear the archer’s laugh, currently drowned out by his own voice, frantic footsteps, violins, and guitars. 

_ “No ves que soy muy poco artístico, muy listo, muy gracioso, soy payaso de rodeo-o!”_[6]

Two steps behind. Mei gravitated towards Satya and she slowed down to allow Mei to carefully copy her movements. Lúcio clung onto Genji to wipe away the laughing tears in his eyes. Lena and Reinhardt dominated the floor, and Angie somehow landed herself in Fareeha’s arms. 

Two steps to the front. The end of the lyrics meant the end of his turn, but the song still had a solid two minutes’ worth of the jig. He dodged Reinhardt’s elbow and danced around Winston’s bulk to hover over his target. Quarter turn. 

“Care to dance, Mister Shimada?” he pulled off his hat and extended it to the archer, who was looking at him as if he had gone mad, still beaming with laughter. 

“No thank you. I am content to sit here and watch this spectacle unfold.” Two steps to the right. 

“Suit yourself, sweetheart.” He shot him a wink, planted his hat over Hanzo’s neat hair and shimmied back over to cut between Angela and Fareeha. They both pushed him away and right into Reinhardt, who immediately grabbed him up as a partner. Two steps to the left, behind, forward, turn, and a fist in the air to finish off the song. 

* * *

 

“Faree, do y’know a lick of Japanese?” 

They sat in the cockpit, surrounded by blinking buttons and endless blue through the windows. They were flying over Chinese airspace, a few hours away from their destination. Jesse propped up his boots on a small portion of the controls that didn’t look too terribly important. 

“Only ‘ _ konnichiwa’ _ . You?” She answered, and carefully shoved his feet off.[7]

“Genji-kun tried to teach me years ago. Never caught.” 

“The cyborg? Was he Blackwatch as well?” 

“Naw, Angie kept him in the end. But anything Shimada related was enough for Gabe to keep me on their regular roster. Anyway, back to this Japanese thing…”  he wasn’t saying it with personal interest, honestly. “Think we can convince Mei to give us a few lessons?” 

“Not the two natives?” she quirked an eyebrow. 

He chuckled, “Well, Hanzo’s a hardass. Zen’s meditating. Mei’s our best best.” 

“And Genji?” 

“Wouldn’t be helpful.” said McCree resolutely. He knew a request to learn, ‘Hanzo, cover my ass’ would result in Genji making him say something crude and conveniently ass-related. 

They called Mei into the cockpit. At their request, she asked,  “Do you know how to introduce yourselves?” They both shook their heads. 

Mei nodded hers. “First impressions are very important, and there is a set way of introducing yourself. When you meet someone for the first time, you politely say  _ ‘hajimemashite’,  _ your name followed by  _ ‘desu’  _ and finish with  _ ‘yoroshiku onegaishimasu’. _ ”

Jesse and Fareeha parroted the phrase to each other, and then turned back to their teacher. “What’re we sayin’ exactly?” Jesse asked. 

“Nice to meet you, my name is McCree. Please take care of me from now on.”

“Take care of me?” Fareeha asked. 

“It’s traditional.” Mei explained, and earned herself a pair of understanding, if skeptical, ‘ _ aaah’s’ _ . 

“Your accent is terrible.” a laughing Genji appeared behind Mei in the doorway to look down at Fareeha. “Yours though, McCree, is still strangely decent.” 

“It’s the Spanish.” explained Hanzo, coming to a stop behind his brother. “I have noticed that his pronunciation of vowels and rounded consonants is similar to Japanese.” 

“Why,  _ arigatou.”  _

“How do you say ‘blatant favoritism’ in Japanese?” Fareeha whispered to Mei. Mei shrugged. 

Genji said, “It’s not really ‘please take care of me’ all the time. It can also mean ‘let’s cooperate’ or ‘let’s work well together’.” 

“The nuance is in the nature of the meeting place and who it is you are introducing yourself to.” said Hanzo. 

“For example, if you’re meeting your in-laws, it most definitely means ‘please take care of me’.” Genji told Jesse pointedly.  

Fareeha brought them down on a landing pad on the roof of the United Nations University main building. They were greeted by a bowing line of the top brass of the university, and then ushered into a large meeting room and handed the supplies Winston had promised them in nondescript duffel bags. They changed into civilian clothing, glanced over their fake identities, and reported back to Winston in Gibraltar. Any press that had seen their emblazoned transport would be told they were attending a private event hosted by the university and were unavailable for comment. 

Mei was disappointed when she found out Fujiyoshida was too close to take a bullet train, so instead they took a packed train full of locals and tourists to the city overlooked by the castle at Hanamura and the majesty of Mt. Fuji. McCree complained about the humid heat and Fareeha commented on preferring the desert. Athena snagged them three hotel rooms in the middle of the week of Obon, which the Shimadas commended as a nigh impossible feat. At the hotel, Jesse began to entertain wishful thoughts of shared rooms only to have them dashed when Hanzo claimed his brother and the girls walked off arm in arm. Zenyatta took the last key from the receptionist and turned to him expectantly. 

“Our accommodations are on the eighth floor.” 

“Hope you don’t mind I snore.” 

“I hope you don’t mind I hum.”

The rooms were swept for bugs, and Hanzo stayed behind to organize their information as the rest scoured the general area of the city guided by Athena for intel and anyone even slightly Shimada-gumi-looking. Which they found. Quite a lot. 

“Sweetheart, you’d best keep that pretty face of yours hidden away just a bit longer. Pharah’s tailing a suspicious individual who ain’t too subtle with his tattoos.” He said casually into his handheld comm for the sake of appearances from his seat in a little cafe.

“This is a mission. You will address me as is appropriate, Agent McCree.” 

“Copy that, Agent Archer,” he said just to be annoying. He got a huff from the other end and grinned. 

“This is Pharah, reporting. I have confirmed that there’s a dead drop scheduled to happen tomorrow night, specifics unclear. There was mention of dancing, from what Athena’s translation program picked up… perhaps some sort of party?” 

“If it’s tomorrow, it’ll be the Bon Odori they were talking about. It’s going to be packed, and they’re bound to have eyes everywhere.” Genji’s voice was overlaid by the sound of traffic and loud music. McCree watched the woman and the omnic he had been keeping an eye on leave the cafe over the rim of his coffee cup. The busboy was very efficient indeed in clearing their table and pocketing a soiled napkin.

_ “Wakatta _ . Zenyatta, do you have eyes on your mark?” Hanzo said as McCree paid and followed them out at a distance.[8]

“Yes. He seems hard at work arranging flowers in his shop.”

“He was seen in the company of known members of the Shimada-gumi. We do not know the extent of the family’s reach. In the past, we had many local businesses bought out and under our power. Do not linger, and be cautious that anyone suspicious may well be reported back to whoever is heading the family.” 

“Yeah, you can mark the cafe as one o’ them. I’ve got movement.” McCree stalled behind a corner, “Don’t look now Zen, but those two incoming are mine. Looks like, yep, they’re heading into the shop.” 

Hanzo’s voice was preceded by the sound of a bell and a cheerful voice calling out  _ ‘Irasshaimase!’_[9]

“That will be one of their fronts then,” he spoke in a whisper, the plonky theme song of a convenience store chain playing in the background. “Mark them on the map for Athena and move on unless you see any reason to linger.” 

“Did you leave your room, sweetheart?” Jesse said as he and Zenyatta casually made their way down the street to the next hotspot on Athena’s map.

“Only for a moment. I took the precaution of wearing a surgical mask.” 

“Agent Hanzo, if you get caught because you caught a case of the munchies…” Fareeha sighed. 

_ “Genji, okā-san wa donna mono ga suki? Tabemono wa?”  _ Hanzo asked, voice gentle and considerate. Jesse wondered what was in a convenience store that brought that softness out of him. 

_ “Anpan. Ojī-chan wa… eeto… tabun… karīpan?”   _

_ “Chichiue wa?”  _ The sound of plastic wrappers.

_ “Iran.”  _ Genji bit out.[10]

Hanzo sighed, clearly annoyed by something, but he didn’t argue. “McCree, Pharah. Athena has uploaded a rendezvous point onto your handhelds. She has a lead on an abandoned building nearby that may serve as their storage facility. Stake it out. Mei, Zenyatta, you’re with Genji.” 

At the end of a successful day, Genji returned to the hotel with incense and an eggplant in hand. He and Hanzo locked themselves in their room, Zenyatta meditated hovering over his bed, and Mei and Fareeha crashed into their room in hastily tied hotel provided yukatas to invite them to the hotel’s  _ sento  _ bathhouse. McCree promptly began shucking off his clothing and Mei turned her back politely, but Fareeha simply commented on the extra inch or so around his waist with a raised eyebrow. 

“We invited the brothers too,” she told him as he kicked off his pants, “But they were doing some Obon thing, like what you, Gabe, and Martin used to do in Novemb- oh gods,  _ akh,  _ at least put the robe on before you moon me!” 

“Is it right over left or left over right?” he asked, considering how to tie his yukata closed. Mei squeaked out the answer, and Zenyatta bid them all a good time when they rushed out the door.  

The bath house was more or less busy with how many patrons the hotel saw that time of year. Mei and Fareeha disappeared through the rightmost blue curtain while Jesse let himself through the red on the left. Calling back on missions past and Gabe’s etiquette training made Jesse remember the process of sitting at a mirrored little stall, washing off, and then ambling through the steam in search of the tub most likely to scald him thoroughly. Experience proved those were the most likely to be relatively empty. Experience also taught him to hide the tattoo on his back with the towel not currently held to his waist.

He found a circular tub near the back, whose only other occupant was a little wrinkled old man that opened his eyes to see a tall foreigner considering how gracefully he could enter the tub without dislodging the water. He closed his eyes again. Jesse took that as permission and grit his teeth against the torture of mildly cooking himself until he could sit at the opposite end and let his body adjust to the temperature. 

He let his eyes close as well, and felt the slight growth of lightheadedness at breathing in steam for so long. The heat soothed and loosened muscles tight with stress from the life he led. The only sound in the wide room was the sound of a kid splashing two tubs away and the quiet admonishments of his father. Jesse dipped further into the water, and let the back of his head rest against the tile. He ran through the mission plan in his head, puzzling out how to best use the information they had gathered that day to their advantage when they--

“Do you prefer the excessive heat of this water for the relaxation benefits, or because you miss your Texas heat?” 

If Jesse jumped, swallowed a mouthful and splashed water in a manner uncouth for a bathhouse and earned himself an unimpressed look from the little old man, then he was blaming it on Shimada ninja training. He twisted around and was met with the glorious sight of Hanzo Shimada standing over him with nothing but a thin blue towel wrapped precariously around his trim waist.  _ Dios.  _ His eyes skated along the dip of his hipbones as he swallowed dryly and croaked out, “I ain’t from Texas.”[11]

Hanzo exhaled through his nose, sounding incredibly put-upon. He made stepping into boiling water look easy when he settled in to his right. “Then where?” he asked in a whisper with the other patrons in mind as he draped that same blue towel around his shoulders.

“New Mexico.” he answered in kind. “Genji?” 

“He and Zenyatta went to pay their respects to a local temple and visit one of their Shambali contacts in the city.” Hanzo’s face was already flushed from the heat, and his eyes were doing that pretty thing where they were ringed in red. The tips of his hair floated in the water to his neck, and that little old man was giving Jesse a look that told him he wasn’t being all too subtle. He turned away under the pretense of checking his arm for nonexistent water damage. He felt eyes on him, so he turned his head to see Hanzo inspecting the skin at his back. His hand broke the surface of the water and stopped just shy of touching.

“I don’t mind.” Jesse breathed, and that was all the permission Hanzo needed to reach out and curiously trace his finger along a wreathe of wings surrounding a glaring skull biting down on a lock. 

“I presume you got your arm to match?” He asked plainly and pulled his hand back under the water. Jesse chuffed a laugh at his dry wit.  

There was no way the heir to the Shimada clan didn’t know about the notorious Deadlock Gang. But Jesse didn’t see judgement in his eyes when he turned back to face him. Instead he saw a new light of understanding and a mountain of curious questions that were held back by his pursed lips. 

They sat in silence after that, but Jesse didn’t stay for much longer. He had been there a while, and he was getting pruney. He didn’t expect Hanzo to stand up right after he did and tie his towel back in place before stepping out and following him out of the soaking area.

Jesse was overcome by a sudden and wholly uncharacteristic sense of modesty back in the changing area. But being all too aware of how he compared to Hanzo’s physique challenged his complete lack of shame. That ache in his gut was back full force, fueled by Hanzo’s gaze and the memory of his fingers tracing light against the skin of his back. He faltered with his yukata hanging loose, unable to remember what Mei had said an hour ago. Right over left or-- 

“You are not attending a funeral. It goes the other way.” Hanzo said impatiently, already dressed and waiting by the door. Jesse blinked. He hadn’t realized the archer was waiting on him. Or watching him. He was watching him.  _ Santa Madre,  _ but those eyes alone were enough to get Jesse desperately thinking of Reinhardt in fluffy pajamas to kill the sudden spike of heat that traveled directly south.[12]

“Wuh?” Eloquent as ever when facing down the lordly dragon that  _ still hadn’t stopped staring.  _

_ “Mā-”  _ Hanzo’s face was still red from the heat of the baths.[13] He stalked forward and Jesse remembered being pressed against a wall and wishfully hoped for a more productive repeat. But instead Hanzo reached out to flip back open his robe, gaze flicking quickly downwards and then back up as he put left over right and tied the sash with more force than necessary. Then he splayed both hands over Jesse’s chest, smoothing out the fabric, and lingered there.

_ “Yabai.” _ Hanzo whispered, then snatched his hands back with a frantic glance upwards and fled out of the bathhouse door, whispering that same word over and over beneath his breath.[14]

“Uh..” So, that time in the hallway hadn’t been brought on by the alcohol. Hanzo had been completely sober just now when he snuck himself an eyeful. Jesse wasn’t delusional, and Jesse might just have a chance at something to ease back the loneliness that constantly nipped at his heels. And if Jesse didn’t get a move on, he suspected the archer would avoid the subject just like last time, so he shook himself out of his momentary shock and chased after. 

He walked out just in time to see Genji and Zenyatta walking past the receptionist, and Hanzo making a beeline for his brother to drag him away to the elevators. 

“McCree, I brought you back something called a  _ taiyaki.  _ Genji assures they are very good.” Zenyatta made friendly conversation on their own elevator ride up to their room. 

Jesse swallowed the little fish pastry in three bites, thanked him for his thoughtfulness, then high-tailed it their room and locked himself, his hand, and the feel of Hanzo’s scorching eyes in the bathroom with the showerhead turned on full blast.

He sent a silent prayer of thanks to whatever god still cared enough to make sure that the reality of what just transpired in that bath house only hit him once the yukata was peeled off and lay rumpled on the bathroom floor. Water pounded against his back as his imagination conjured up the feeling of hands on his chest pulling the robe open instead of closed, snaking across his ribs and down, one at his neck and in his hair like that night weeks ago. Sharp brown eyes pinning him in place, his hand reached down to encourage his thickening cock. 

One stroke, then two in time with the thought of a  _ sake _ scented voice panting hot against his neck, a hand calloused by a bow sliding wet along his hard length instead of his own. Imperious voice, haughty and regal and  _ good god, what would he sound like?  _ Would he gasp as Jesse was gasping, if Jesse went down on his knees and bit at the thighs he had seen beneath that blue towel? If he let his teeth and tongue trail up to the heavy, leaking prize settled beneath the smooth cut of his hipbones? He could taste it, bitter and thick against his tongue, and he had to clap a hand to his mouth to stifle the moan brought on by the image of Hanzo staring down at him with those lovely eyes of his framed in a red flush.

White striped the wall of the shower and was slowly washed away by the stream of water as Jesse stood trying to calm his breathing, forehead pressed against cold tile. He fumbled with the tap handles until they twisted closed, then redressed and resolutely stomped to bed. 

If Zenyatta had any suspicions as to why Jesse needed to bathe twice, he didn’t say a word. 

* * *

 

Lanterns lit the streets in a soft yellow glow, the soft summer breeze carried with it the scent of sizzling  _ takoyaki  _ and roasting street food. Children ran around in colorful yukatas, toting water balloons and bags of goldfish. Couples strolled arm in arm, stopping at booths to play for prizes while tourists wandered around with their eyes blown in awe, especially at the sight of lanterns bobbing on the waves of the nearby lake. 

Dancers wove in a circular formation around a wooden yagura to the melody of the singers and musicians onstage. Athena’s drone bobbed behind the cover of a cusp of trees.  The scene was joyous and bright, full of life. 

Jesse stood a ways from it all, watching the festivities with a sharp eye to pick out the two men he knew would be arriving to leave a package at the stall selling bouquets. He leaned against a metal guardrail along a stairwell lined with tall slate tombstones. The only people that ventured this far up had the small graveyard behind him as their destination. They paid the cowboy no more than a passing glance, tourists were aplenty and dressed in just as ridiculous garb. 

“Status?” Demanded Hanzo’s voice in his ear. 

“Clear.” Rang the voices of his teammates. He added his to the bunch. The smoke rising from the incense offerings at the family shrines mingled with the smoke at the end of his cigarillo as he pulled from it deeply. Clear, but Jesse couldn’t shake a feeling of dread. A celebration for the dead lit up in colors that reminded him a bit too much of marigolds and people long buried and gone. The more recent; Gabe, Ana and Jack. Others that hadn’t survived what Blackwatch demanded. Heroes lost in a world recovering from war. His father’s retreating back, his mother’s lifeless eyes. 

The gloom wasn’t uncharacteristic, but it was out of place. Usually Jesse could focus on a mission and repress ugly thoughts until he could safely unpack them and drown them at a later time. Now, they clung like the smoke seeping into his clothes as he made his way past the line of lit incense sticks. 

He spotted movement coming from a building closed down and hidden behind vendors. The cafe. 

“Hanzo, I see them, headed your way.” He began to make his way down and paused to leave room for a family making their way up the stairs. He heard them talking, and watched as the son stiffened halfway up a step and then tugged at his mother’s skirt. 

_ “Mama, mama,”  _ he whimpered, _ “Kimochi warui.” _ [15]

_ “Doushita no?”  _ she answered and kneeled down to check his temperature. McCree spared them one last glance before continuing on his way.[16]

More smoke gathered, floating just off the ground. He looked down at it curiously. 

“I am in pursuit. Pharah, corral them toward the alley. Mei, be prepared to freeze them. McCree, what’s your position? I do not see you.” Hanzo said. 

_ “O...onaka itai! Itai, mama!”  _ The boy started crying.[17]

_ “Okashi tabesugimashita yo.”   _ His mother soothed.[18]

_ “Vaya, parece que la araña me manda un regalo.”  _ Whispered a rasping voice in Spanish directly behind him.[19]

Jesse froze. He whipped back around to scan the area around the clustered family. The father was offering his son a piggyback ride, but the kid was inconsolable. The mother had a queasy look on her face, and for a moment her skin became the color of desert sand and Jesse had to blink to bring himself back to the present. The night and the smoke and his damn head were playing tricks on him. From the tip of his cigarillo rose grey smoke, and with it twisted tendrils of black. The feeling of dread rose, choking him,  _ alone, always alone, no one wants you, no one cares enough to stay, no one stays alive long enough to try. _

“McCree?” Jesse heard his name ride on the sound of Mei’s freezing blast. 

“McCree, report!” Fareeha barked.

Three bodies rushed past him back down the stairs. The smoke followed them, riding on the shoulders of the crying child. Black, sickly, a harbinger of death and decay. Jesse’s clouded mind brought up the recall and Athena’s security footage of a wraith infiltrating the Watchpoint.

“Houston, we, uh, got a problem. Winston?” He watched the black fog float down an empty street lit by flickering lights. He didn’t bother with the last few steps, instead he vaulted over the guardrail and ran after. He lost the stub of his cigarillo in his haste. “Reaper’s here. I’m in pursuit.” 

“Talon.” Hanzo cursed just as Winston came online and roared a, “WHAT?” 

“McCree, stand down, I repeat, do NOT go after him on your own!”

“I’m not gonna engage, but if he’s here then Amélie was tellin’ the truth!” He took a turn down a narrow street to follow the thin trail of smoke.

“I will follow from above.” said Fareeha. “Helix has had their share of confrontations with this Reaper. Jesse, be careful.” 

“No. Pharah, go with Mei and Zenyatta.” Hanzo ordered. “Genji, you’re closer. I will be there shortly.” 

“This drop was only a cover. We will follow another lead in hope that it bears better fruit.” said Zenyatta. McCree skidded to a stop when he turned into a narrower alley leading to a wide open service door flanked by unpleasant looking fellas wielding wicked looking blasters. The Reaper materialized just long enough to point a clawed hand at him. Then he was gone, and his men responded by lifting their guns.

“Aw shit. This’s McCree. I’d appreciate backup right about now.” He turned tail and bolted.

“I am here.” Genji appeared in a flash along the roofs, showering his attackers with bladed stars. 

“Athena is guiding me to your location. I don’t suppose you could stay still.” Hanzo was breathing heavily, sign that he was bolting over terraces and balconies in his haste to join them.

“Nope!” 

_ “Kuso. _ This one had EMPs.” Genji said, and McCree doubled back down another street away from the festival and its civilians and saw Genji jump away, sparking slightly. 

“You good back there, Genji-kun?” A group of fifteen or so were hot on his heels, and there wasn’t much room to weave when they pelted him with blasts. One blew a hole through his  _ sarape _ and skated off the edge of his chest plate, another nearly had him at his calf. His only saving grace was the recharge time for their weapons. He hid behind a dark restaurant sign to shoot four of them in the head. Two more were downed by a shot to the knee as he combat rolled to the other side of a street and a slim path between two buildings. He reloaded, and twisted to shoot down three as they were forced to go after him in single file. 

“Yo. Currently engaging with a couple of omnics, they have flight modifications. I wonder if Angela could give me some.” 

“Genji, down!” called Hanzo. McCree heard the distant sound of his scatter arrows. He kept running.

The path opened wider, and he realized too late as he took another turn that he didn’t know this area at all, and that he was now facing the outer walls of the building he and Fareeha had staked out. They had decreed it was empty. 

“Well, in for a penny.” he ducked under a rusted rolling steel door and was met with the emptiness of the cavernous warehouse. Nowhere to go, except a door at the other end that conveniently opened to spew in more of the Shimada-gumi just as the overhead lights turned on.

No cover, but he did have enough bullets to down every single one of the crowing gangsters converging on him. It’s too bad he wouldn’t have the time before they made swiss cheese out of him. 

_ “Korosanaide! Shinigami wa yankī o nozonde iru!”  _ said one in a purple suit that stepped out in front of the rest to regard McCree with a satisfied grin. He didn’t like the look he gave him.[20]

_ “Goshi o koroshita!” _ said another, sporting the good ol’ yakuza hair coif. He cursed. They had him surrounded.[21]

_ “Yame-”  _ The boss stopped talking when a bullet lodged itself in his skull. McCree had hoped that killing the leader would send the rest into a disorder mild enough to win him some time, but they just turned on him with ugly leers.[22]

_ “Baka!”[23] _

Okay, experience told him that that didn’t mean cow. Experience told him he was a damn idiot that probably killed the only goon that had kept their blasters set to stun. 

He tossed them a flashbang and took the few seconds it won him to shoot down six more in a panic and try to find a way out. There wasn’t one. They retaliated by bringing up their humming blasters and taking aim. He could throw another flashbang, but what good would it do him? The loading bars on the sides of their weapons were almost filled. There was nowhere to run.

“Right fellas, anyone got any good last words I can cash in right about now?” He called into the comm when he drew a blank. “I would say it ain’t my time, but…”

“McCree!” Genji yelled in his ear, appearing through the doorway just as the men drew back their triggers and a shout rang out from above. 

_ “Ryū ga waga teki o kurau!”  _

Hanzo’s voice. Always so angry, bless his pea-pickin’ lil’ heart.

He saw the light of the enemies’ cannons as the beams lit within the barrels and burst forth. He should have heard their accompanying  _ boom,  _ instead he heard a feral roar that would have made him shit his pants if he hadn’t already gone numb with the resigned acceptance of his own death. 

He should have felt searing heat, the pain of being shot through with beams of light hotter than the sun. Instead he felt weightless when he was thrown forward onto the ground like a ragdoll by a force that he could only describe as divine intervention. 

The smell of ozone filled his nostrils. At first he felt nothing, and then he felt everything. Sensory overload. He felt shocked, lightning coursed around him, inside him. The sound of screams and ripping flesh died away as the roar ended, and instead of fear and anger he felt warmth. He flipped onto his back and expected to see a storm, dark and angry and vengeful. Instead, his eyes were met with a blue that belonged to the daytime of summer skies atop fields of green and gold. 

He felt weightless. He quickly realized that it was because he was floating atop semi-translucent scales that had materialized beneath him. They tipped him onto his feet and he stood shakily, looking around himself and the eye of the storm he found himself in. All around him and stretching up to the grey slate of the ceiling were thick coils of electric blue. They twisted, and a dragon’s head emerged. McCree only managed not to scream because he recognized it from the top of Hanzo’s wrist and had witnessed Genji’s trick a few times. 

_ “Arāra, nanda kimi ka? Hajimemashite.”  _ the dragon said with a brash, rasping voice that didn’t belong on this plane of existence. It belonged to the whorl of a storm atop a furious sea. Its huge mouth was curved open in a sliver, but didn’t move as it spoke.[24]

“Uh… Howdy.” He was proud his voice was only higher by one octave instead of several. He didn’t even have enough sense of self to tip his hat. 

A voice spoke from behind him, overbearing and razor-sharp,  _ “Shinsetsu nishi nasai.”  _ It was so loud and sudden it let loose the scream Jesse had been holding back. He looked over his shoulder and promptly faced forward again, wishing he hadn’t.[25]

_ “Hai hai, ja… Jeshi Makkurī desu ka?”  _ A huge, toothy, pointy, grin. Jesse figured it could swallow him whole without trying very hard. Did dragons unhinge their jaws like snakes did? He almost wanted to ask.[26]

“Yeah, that… that’s me, alright.” 

_ “Hontō ni?”  _ the one in front said just as one behind growled and made him rethink the whole shitting his pants thing.[27]

“Right, well uh… it was a pleasure meetin’ you both. Thanks for eatin’ those guys and not eatin’ me, much appreciated. Uh…  _ yoroshiku onegaishimasu?”_

The voices rumbled a deep laugh. The sound of it vibrated in him, in the particles of air around him.  _ “Yoroshiku onegaishimasu.”[28] _

“Yeah, I’ll be sure to return the gesture.” He answered, more than a bit deliriously. Genji and Hanzo’s parents were dead. Did the family deities count as in-laws?

They flew off in another rush of wind, and McCree promptly fell back on his ass and began disassociating with the entire ordeal. He watched in detached fascination as they flew up to where Hanzo was watching him on the landing of a fire escape through a shattered window. Their long bodies shrank as they closed in on their master, and one bumped its nose against Hanzo’s outstretched hand before melting back into his skin in a hazy blue glow. McCree was saved the piercing look of the dragon’s eyes when the younger one popped directly into his field of vision. 

“I see you’ve taken a liking to being the damsel in distress.” Genji said with a relieved but laughing voice. He stood over him with a hand offered down to pull him up. McCree blinked, but the bright blue of the dragons and Hanzo’s eyes remained burned to the backs of his eyelids. 

“Am I actually dead, or does your dragon talk too?” He asked, back on his feet but unsteady. He shook the dust off his chaps. “Goddamn. I’m one more shock away from passin’ out.”

“They spoke to you?” Genji ducked beneath his arm to take on some of his weight and cast a look behind him to where Hanzo was climbing down, speaking to the rest of the team on the comm.  

“We  _ hajimemashite _ ’d and everything.” He said, and Hanzo looked between the two of them, checking for injuries. “Hey archer, what beef do you got with me that your dragons decided they hadda run me through an intervention?” 

Hanzo’s eyes widened, and he quickly looked down at his tattoo and then back at him. “They spoke to you?”

“Oh my god.” whispered Genji. 

“Oh my god!” Yelled out a different voice altogether. Jesse and Genji looked up when the lights of the warehouse flickered off just as Hanzo ran the rest of the way to them. They fell into battle positions as they looked around the dark for the source, a woman whose accented voice blasted from the mounted speakers set up at the corners of the building.

_ “Okey, nadie me dijo que iba a haber dragones! Dragones! Bale, como te conseguiste un amigo con dragones? Me lo introduces?” _

Genji and Hanzo exchanged matching looks of confusion as they stiffened, ready for another attack. Jesse scowled. That wasn’t the voice that had spoken back by the graveyard. This was the second time he heard Spanish in the land of the rising sun, and once was already enough not to be a coincidence.  _ “Quien eres? Trabajas con Talón?”  _

_ “Si es algún consuelo, los hubiéramos matado por matarte.”  _ the woman said, as if the lives of those that were surely working under or with her were disposable. He eyed what was left of their corpses with a wrinkled nose. _ “Sus órdenes eran traerte vivo. Hablando de eso, te tengo una pregunta: porque te quiere tanto?”  _

_ “De quien hablas?”  _ Next to one of the bodies laid a communicator that must’ve fallen out of their pocket in the attack. The screen lit up and then the holo feature started up, projecting a blanket of purple. At the center sat a sugar skull. Hanzo launched a sonar arrow at each corner of the wide room, but there was no one there but them.

“Agents, can you hear me? ” Winston relayed. “Somethings scrambling our signal, you’ve gone dark.” 

“My drone is being rerouted back towards the rest of the team, I cannot get a visual.” Athena reported.

_ “Para que cayera el rey, le quitaron su dama.”  _ said the hacker, _ “Y tu, caballo? Porque no caiste?”  _

Genji, Hanzo, and Jesse stood back to back, wary of any movement.  _ “Quien eres?”  _ Jesse asked again, his gun pointed at the ground.

_ “Ay nadie, nomas una sombra. Relájate, chico. Tu preocupate por los hermanitos.” _

He looked to the brothers watching his back.  _ “Que quieres con ellos?” _

_ “Yo? Nada. El jefazo? Ese es otro rollo. Hasta luego, Jesse James!” _ With a cheerful  _ ‘boop!’  _ the holo faded out and the little communicator combusted. Then the lights lit back up.[29]

“Wrong Jesse.” he muttered and Winston announced that they were back online. Athena hastened to try to pinpoint the signal of the breach. 

“What was that about?” Genji asked, falling back into a casual pose. 

“Who was that, McCree? What did she say?” Hanzo turned him around to face him with a hand wrapped around his wrist. Jesse holstered Peacekeeper and glared out at the emptiness of the warehouse. 

“She…”  _ To make the king fall, they took away his queen.  _ The king. Reyes? But he hadn’t worn the crown. The crown had been Jack’s, figuratively speaking. And what did Jesse have to do with the fall of royalty? 

_ ‘Porque te quiere tanto?’  _ the sugar skull had asked, like Amélie had warned him as she climbed onto that helicopter. ‘ _ They want you, and they’ll have you. They had me.’  _

“She wasn’t makin’ much sense.” he settled on, “She told me to watch out for you two.” 

“You’d better get out of there, you’ve got law enforcement incoming. We don’t know where Reaper went, keep alert.” Winston ordered, “Athena’ll find you a safe route to join the others, they just got their hands on some intel. You’re done for tonight, agents.” 

The three of them gave their affirmative, Genji helped Jesse stagger out and they made their way through the dark, chasing the sound of people celebrating a night when the dead returned to join the living. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To all of you out there currently going through finals hell, good luck. You got this. Go kick ass. To those of you in retail hell, godspeed my friends. I’m gonna go sleep now. Good morning.
> 
> Translations:
> 
> [1]little sister  
> [2]brother  
> [3]serenade  
> [4]my grandma  
> [5]The two lines of Lulu’s song:  
> Wow, wow, you’re killing me like this  
> Oh, if I get you, oh oh, if I get you  
> [6]Fuck do i really hafta translate payaso de rodeo ok here we go McCree’s song:  
> Crossing the border I came across him, he was a kinda strange guy but he was okay-  
> He told me that for sure there was nothing better than to break out a hat-  
> I told them come come come, little animal come and follow me and see what you’ll learn-  
> What’s dangerous is funny, what’s difficult is lovely- (and hey he looks at hanzo at this bit)  
> Can’t you see I’m just a bit artistic, very smart and very funny I’m a rodeo clown!  
> [7]hello  
> [8]understood  
> [9]Welcome!  
> [10]Han: Genji, what kind of food did mom like?  
> Gen: Red bean paste buns. As for grandpa...uhh.. Maybe curry bread?  
> Han:What about father?  
> Gen: We don’t need (any for him)  
> [11]God  
> [12]Holy Mary  
> [13]Oh, for-  
> [14]literally, it means ‘dangerous’ but it’s commonly used as ‘oh no’. But it can be like, really cute when people use it? Think like, BB-8 levels of distressed beeping. Oh no oh no this is bad oh no abort  
> [15]Mommy, mommy, it feels bad  
> [16]What’s wrong?  
> [17]M...my stomach hurts! It hurts, mommy!  
> [18]You ate too many sweets  
> [19]Well, it seems the spider sent me a present  
> [20]Don’t kill him! The Reaper wants the yankee!  
> [21]He killed Goshi!  
> [22]Stop!  
> [23]Stupid!  
> [24]Oh my, it’s you, isn’t it? Well met.  
> [25]Be polite.  
> [26]Yeah yeah, anyway… Jesse McCree, is it?  
> [27]Is it really?  
> [28]The dragons totally mean ‘please take care of our master from now on’  
> [29]And here is the convo between Sombra and Jess from the top:  
> Som: Okay, no one told me there would be dragons! Dragons! Dude, how did you get yourself a friend with dragons? Can you introduce me?  
> Jess: Who are you? You work with Talon?  
> Som: If it’s any consolation, we would’ve killed them for killing you. Their orders were to bring you in alive. Speaking of which, I’ve got a question: Why does he want you so bad? (Could also be read as: why does he love you so much?)  
> Jess: What are you talking about?  
> Som: For the King to fall, they took away his Queen. What about you, Knight? Why didn’t you fall? (this is more… better in Spanish cuz in Spanish the ‘knight’ is called the ‘horse’ and he’s a cowboy…)  
> Jess: Who are you?  
> Som: Oh nobody, just a shadow. Calm down, kid. You worry about the brothers.  
> Jess: What do you want with them?  
> Som: Me? Nothing. The boss? That’s a whole ‘nother story. See you later, Jesse James.
> 
> Songs sung at karaoke party are:  
> Fareeha- It's Raining Men by The Weather Girls  
> Reinhardt- Waterloo by ABBA  
> Genji- Night Rocker by David Hasselhoff  
> Lena- World is Mine by Hatsune Miku (Vocaloid)  
> Lúcio- Ai Se Eu Te Pego by Michel Teló  
> Jesse- Payaso de Rodeo by Caballo Dorado
> 
> yo hit me up on tumblr if u wanna, i'm [ cantodelcolibri](https://cantodelcolibri.tumblr.com/)  
> and thanks so so much for all ur kudos and lovely comments ilu so much


	12. Restless Summer Air

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s cold. Cold as balls. But I have fond memories of when it was hot and all my coworkers would slump uselessly in their chairs during lunch break and comment “atsui desu ne” like a broken record. 
> 
> See end notes for translations, hover over for kanji if you're on pc

Shin. Zen. Bi. 

Hanzo brought Storm Bow down in a wide arc, letting a sonar arrow fly. He watched, counting enemies as the arrow revealed them. He stood on a roof in the shadow of the looming Shimada-jo, Zenyatta unseen on the other side, doing the same as him. It was the last day to nail down patterns, tomorrow they would storm the castle. They were acting on what Mei, Fareeha, and Zenyatta had discovered nights ago while the rest of their team had wasted time chasing a ghost.

Chasing a cowboy chasing a ghost. Chasing a cowboy for no good reason other than the panic Hanzo had allowed to momentarily cloud his judgement.

It would be a lie to say he had made the decision in Overwatch’s best interests. McCree’s later admission that he had received two cryptic messages in Spanish helped uphold the integrity of Hanzo’s call. There’d been no need to admit the truth.

Truth. Goodness. Beauty. _Shin. Zen. Bi._

The mantra chanted at him, whispered and admonished from the moment his hand wrapped around the wood of his first bow.

Kawashima-sensei’s first lesson had been to teach them that _kyūdō_ was not archery. In _kyūdō,_ it matters not whether you hit the target, so long as you remain true to yourself. Genji, always partial to the sword, called bullshit.

Hanzo had been too busy appeasing their teacher to voice his own doubts.

At the time, Hanzo had cared little for their teacher’s words. He shared in Genji’s sentiment. If the point wasn’t to hit the target, then what was it? Flowery words about trust, inner peace, and clarity were lost on a pair of children. Hanzo much preferred to devote himself to arts that held practicality such as _kend_ _ō_ , _jūdō, ninjutsu._ _Kyūdō_ was not a study he would have chosen for himself, and if it hadn’t been for their father’s desire to see his sons well versed in all traditional arts, he would have foregone it altogether.

His communicator buzzed in his pocket.

Hanzo pushed aside memories brought on by proximity to his childhood home and closed his tally, crossed shingled roofs, past the arcade, the Rikimaru, then commed Zenyatta to tell him to meet back at base. He dropped to the sidewalk, then turned to a crowded street to blend in with the crowd. The summer heat kept him miserable as he was forced to don a jacket to hide his tattoo, but summer allergies allowed him to wear a surgical mask over his face. He pulled out his handheld.

 

**[Agent: SHIMADA, G.] GCND:**

暇だな～

**(11:35)** [0]

 

He powered down the screen. Athena had secured them an abandoned _ryokan_ as lodging for their prolonged mission, per Genji’s suggestion of squatting. He made his way there as he shoved the comm in his back pocket and mulled over what they knew.

There was a dispute over territory- aside from their efforts in securing the immediate area, the Shimada-gumi was in the midst of a turf war, rival gangs that aimed for southward expansion were met with an empire holding strong, but only just. Word had spread of Talon’s interest on a foothold in Japan, and the Shimada-gumi were the obvious choice. But the new alliance brought on differences in opinion. Some latched onto the new Talon authority (like the crew that attacked them during Obon) while others worried about change. Infighting aside, the UN’s orders were to expose those that were contributing to the Shimada-gumi’s rise to power. They were to go in, extract data on fund sources and related parties, then get out.

He reached the _ryokan,_ input the passcode, slid open the door, and eyed the shoe rack at the entryway. Gone were McCree’s boots and Fareeha’s sneakers. Mei’s boots were pushed to the side. Zenyatta didn’t wear shoes. And Genji-

_“Okaeri!”_ [1]

“Has Zenyatta made it back?” Hanzo asked Genji when he slid into view. He shed the jacket, pulled off the mask and shoved it in the pocket of his jeans, then took out a towel to wipe away sweat from the back of his neck. His hair was soaked as well. Maybe he would get it cut.

_“Tadaima,_ Genji. Nice to see you, Genji.” Genji said for him. “No, I thought he was with-”

The door behind Hanzo slid open. There floated the man in question. _“Tadaima.”_ he said pleasantly. [2]

_“Okaeri!”_ Genji greeted, then looked pointedly at Hanzo, who shoved past him to get to the main room. Mei smiled at him from the table when he walked in, but turned right back to the spreadsheets on her tablet. He waved back and went to sit directly below the air conditioner. Genji and Zenyatta joined him on the tatami a minute later. They sat in silence, Genji and Zenyatta meditating while he typed a report for Athena.

He finished his task, hit send, then began to doze off in the quiet laziness of the afternoon. Despite the gust of air blowing directly onto them, it was still hot and humid.

_“Atsui ne?”_ Genji’s low voice jarred him at the edge of dreaming.  [3]

Hanzo hummed his agreement, eyes still shut, content to let the time pass by quietly. But the sound of approaching footsteps and an argument had Hanzo accepting the reality of new company. He opened his eyes when the shoji slid open to see the rest of the team stumble in.

“Fuckin’ hell, it’s hotter’n blue blazes out there!”

“And in here.” Fareeha added, voice lackluster. “Jesse, you need to take this more-”

McCree spoke over her. “Don’t y’all believe in air conditioning?”

“The aircon is on.” Genji pointed up.

“Ya coulda fooled me.” he pulled at the collar of his gingham shirt.

“Jesse!”

“Faree, it ain’t nothin’. Quit naggin’ me. Damn, you sound jus’ like yer mom.”

“Is there a problem?” Hanzo watched absently as McCree’s metal hand began fiddling with the button done up to his neck. With a flick, it became undone.

“We may have been spotted.” Fareeha glared at McCree, who didn’t meet her eye.

“Emphasis on the _may.”_ he scoffed and marched forward to stand in front of the air conditioner. His hand moved down and another button was released from its fastening.

Hanzo sat up and tilted to the side to address Fareeha around McCree’s legs. “Were you followed?”

She shook her head. “No. But we drew the looks of every person we passed on the street. Most of the tourists have cleared out by now, _Jesse.”_ She walked forward to stand next to him. “You can’t be dressed so… so loudly! What if one of the yakuza saw us and put two and two together from the other night?!”

“Loudly?” McCree undid another button. “Now you’re gonna hafta be more specific there, darlin’.”

“I think she means the hat.” Mei suggested.

“The chaps?” Zenyatta offered.

“The boots!” Genji shouted. Hanzo’s eyes zeroed in on the gold belt buckle twinkling slightly above eye level, but he kept his mouth shut.

“I can’t be specific because it’s all of you. You look ridiculous.”

Genji snorted, Mei giggled, and Hanzo had to commend Fareeha for her bravery. Everyone had taken to wearing civilian clothing to blend in on their runs. McCree had simply pulled off his _sarape_ and called it a day.

“You want ridiculous? Mei’s wearing a parka in ninety degree weather!”

“I get cold!” she protested.

“It’s only thirty-two. Don’t exaggerate.” Hanzo said flatly.

“Et tu, archer?” Despite the barbs, he grinned as he loomed over him.

He raised an eyebrow. “If black ops is your specialty, I do wonder why you make it a point to dress like a walking anachronism.”

“Look who’s talkin’, Seven Samurai! Besides, I told you already, I got a look.”

“Yes, and it’s a cheap copy of Clint Eastwood.” Fareeha put in. Hanzo leaned back against the wall and looked up at her, then to McCree, whose fingers fiddled with the fourth button.

“Eastwood, huh?” He drawled, smile wide and lazy, “I dunno Faree, that there’s a tall order. A tall drink of water.” When it popped open, Hanzo fixated on skin dusted with dark brown hair.

“Drink of water?” Hanzo asked. Genji coughed, and it sounded a lot like the word ‘thirsty’. But they were back to bickering, so they went unheard.

“Yes, I see what you mean,” said Zenyatta, accessing some file. “He is quite the handsome, how would you say, fellow.”

“I’m not sure you do him justice.” Fareeha teased, finger prodding McCree’s side.

“Hey now! Now I know I ain’t good. Ain’t bad. But I sure as hell ain’t ugly.”

Fareeha groaned at his reference. Mei offered an air five from the other side of the room. Hanzo had a niggling feeling he should get it. Genji huffed and pulled him to his feet. He went to grab a peach from the bowl at the table, then strode over to the window, yanked it open, nodded at Hanzo as if to say _‘follow me’_ and climbed out and up.

Hanzo looked around at their teammates, but they didn’t give Genji’s departure more than a passing glance. He followed.

His brother had settled on the ledge of the roof. He was peeling the peach with one of his shuriken. He tossed the fuzzy rind at a crow perched on a golden _shachihoko_ and Hanzo watched it dive down to catch the treat as he sat next to his brother.

Genji split the fruit in half, coating his fingers in its juice. _"Hai, onī-chan, hanbun ko."_ [4]

Hanzo took it. Genji took off his mask, and set it in the dip of his lap as he dug into the fruit. Mouth full, he turned to Hanzo.

“How was home? You’ve been lost in your head ever since you returned.”

Hanzo bit into his half. Mouth full, he answered, “Home was…” he swallowed, “Concerning. Insurrection is unlike the Shimada Clan. Our men have always been loyal, steadfast. What makes them falter now?”

“You sound like father.” Genji pulled a face. “It seems the master of the Shimada Clan has returned.” He went on in a falsely grandiose voice.

Hanzo answered in a similar tone, “I will take back what is mine by birthright.”

“Take it back? You can’t be serious.”

The archer shook his head. “Overwatch’s presence is what kept the other families from trying to start up their own empires to replace our own, all those years ago. That they’ve risen enough to garner Talon’s attention…”

He stalled, struggling for words. “The Shimada Clan was not… _we_ were not good people, Genji. Criminals are criminals. We both have blood on our hands, blood of questionable guilt.”

Genji listened intently, the air laden with the truth of their upbringing.

“The family was many things, deplorable things. But,” a wry smile crossed his face, “We were honorable. Everyday citizens had no reason to fear us if they kept their heads down. Hanamura was under our protection. But I look at the district now, and I see fear. This Shimada Clan is not ours.”

He gestured at the town sprawling around them with the peach in his hand. “All of this was to be mine, Genji. If not mine, yours. If not yours, no one’s. Our legacy lies with the dragons. Our line ends with us. Unless,” he shot his brother a considerate look, “In your exploits you managed to sire an heir and failed to tell me about it.”

Heavy moment broken, his little brother snorted. “Please. As if I would ever mess up my birth control. How about you? How do I know you never knocked anyone up?” He took a huge bite of fruit and chewed noisily. “No wait, I forgot! Being frigid is the most effective form of contraception!”

“Shut up.” Hanzo said without much bite. It was true, after a fashion.

“Speaking of sex,” Genji started.

“No.” Hanzo warned.

“You haven’t talked to McCree, haven’t you?”

Hanzo shrugged. He took the last bite of his peach and wiped his hand on his jeans, but kept the pit between his fingers. Genji finished his as well and leaned over to wipe his fingers on the same patch of denim. Then his hand traveled up and pushed against his chest to knock him over onto the tiles. Securing his mask between his thighs, he chose to lay on his side and stare down his brother.

“And you weren’t planning to, either.” he accused.

“I wouldn’t know what to say.” he said honestly.

“You can say you like him.” Genji suggested simply, with a self satisfied smirk. As if it were simple. As if the dragons had not complicated everything Hanzo had thought he knew about what he had chosen to feel.  

Hanzo gave him a bored look and hoped it held. “Yes, but I fail to see what comes after.”

“Eh…” Genji flipped so that he was lying belly-down parallel to his brother. “ _Nī-chan,_ I love you, I do. But I thought father would have covered this. Or our health instructor, at the very least. When I called you frigid I didn’t think you were an actual vir-”

Hanzo lobbed the peach pit at his face. Genji laughed and threw it back but missed. It rolled off the roof and into the street below. His eyes trailed after it. “What is this about?”

“The dragons, they…”

“Spoke to him.” Genji finished.  

Hanzo nodded. “They become us as we become them. That they spoke to him speaks volumes of me, but…” Insecurity rose like bile. “You have known him longer, Genji. You know what he is like. He is larger than life. Loud, friendly, a flirt. He is sure of himself, bold in his actions, blunt with his words. But as honest as he is impulsive. He always means what he says and does.”

_‘My life’s yours.’_

“So tell me, Genji, why _he_ has not chosen to act.” he finished a bit lamely. “He treats me no differently than he does you, or Dr. Ziegler. He treats me as a friend.”

Genji gave an exasperated huff. _“Onī-chan,_ if he looked at me the way he looks at you, I’d consider it incest. It’s obscene.”

“I once saw him direct a similar look at an omnic.”

“Okay, one: omnics are hot. Also, two: you’re an idiot.”

“Regardless, how do I move forward knowing that spirits have chosen for me?”

Genji was quiet for a long time. His eyes were focused on him with such intensity that Hanzo fought not to fidget. He flipped onto his back and stared at the sky. Hanzo followed his lead. His eyes traced a cloud shaped like pachimari.

_"Haha no hanashi oboeteru?”_

_“Mochiron.”_

_“Sō. Chichiue wa binbōdatta._ [5] He didn’t come from a good family, he had no connections. Still, mother loved him. The elders were only convinced to take him on as the adoptive son when the dragons spoke to him. They only speak to those worthy of the Shimada name, and he--” Genji paused, choosing his words carefully, “He was as ready as you were to take control of the family, when she died. What he became is not a reflection of the man he was. The dragons… I like to think they weren’t wrong. But you and I both know that monsters can be born out of grief and anger. And McCree… Jesse is a good man, brother. A good man with a bad past, just like you.”

He hummed, “You mean the Deadlocks.”

“He told you?”

Hanzo shook his head. “I saw his tattoo.”

“Yeah, right around the same time you saw his di-”

_“Dame.”_ [6]

Genji smiled beatifically at him, blinking his eyes innocently. Then he sobered up. “He is everything you said, at face value. But I’ve known him longer. I know what he is like. And speaking honestly, Hanzo, I do believe he is genuine. He likes you.”

_“Yokubō o ai to kondō suru na.”_ [7]

“I would bet there’s plenty of that too.” Little shit. Hanzo threw his brother a scathing glare that was countered with a cocked brow and a lascivious grin. He groaned. Genji laughed.

_“Ana ga attara hairitai.”_ He sat up and ran his hands over his face. [8]

“I’ll be sure to push you in. And, Hanzo? Just because the dragons have decided doesn’t mean you have to. They become us, we become them. You decide the order that happens.”

Hanzo blinked. He stared. “You’re being… suspiciously supportive about this.”

“I am the best wingman! _Tatoeba,_ you don’t know what to say? Then I have the perfect solution!” [9]

Hanzo gave his brother a look that implied he seriously doubted it.

“You should just kiss him! No talking required!” He stretched out like a cat on the tiles, the metal of his body glinting cheerfully in the sunshine. “Then when your heart goes _doki doki_ and he calls you something even more disgusting than _sweetheart,_ you can come find me and I’ll rub it in your face how I was right all along!”

Hanzo seriously considered the benefits of killing him again. He pushed them aside in favor of kicking him in the shin and earning himself a punch to the arm in retaliation.

“Enough of this. _Ashita nara…”_ [10]

* * *

 

It was uncommon for the sky to be as clear as it was, in the middle of August. Not a cloud in sight, despite the fact a typhoon was terrorizing the southern island of Okinawa.

A different storm was terrorizing the streets of Hanamura.

_“Bīng qiáng, shēngqǐ lái ba!”_ [11]

“Well done, Agent Mei.” Hanzo spoke into the comm as he hopped atop her rising ice wall and ran along its length to reach a small window to shoot at the reinforcements that came rushing out of various businesses around the castle. With the wall up, they had no way of entering through the main gates, so they grouped together, easy pickings for his arrows. Mei made icicles of those that ran around trying to sound the alarm within the gates. No doubt all the security cameras were trained on them as they made their obvious approach.

They were loud- Hanzo had taken a page out of McCree’s book and a dressed in a _gi_ of bright yellow bordered in grey. He and Genji had switched scarves, he caught a flash of yellow flitting between the red wooden slats of the windows. Zenyatta’s destruction orbs made a lot of noise as the calculated explosions blocked off side entrances to the grounds. The Shimada-gumi wouldn’t catch Pharah’s streak flying in with McCree to land on the highest _yagura_ of the castle, neither would the sensors Zenyatta scrambled via control panel.

He moved away from the window when the men below spotted him past the cover of a tree. Running over red pillars, he shot at approaching enemies to cover Mei as she raised her second ice wall on the entrance to the garden. When the barrier reached its peak, Mei ran towards Genji and the bell, and Hanzo jumped on the second story ledge, past branches of cherry blossoms, then down to shoot a woman whose gun was trained on his brother.

_“Arigatō yo!”_ [12]

Hanzo nodded his acknowledgement, joining them just as Zenyatta floated into view. He bent down to yank his arrow from her forehead and pressed a finger to his ear to reach out to the absent pair.

“Gates are secure, the garden is blocked off. Agents McCree and Pharah, have you captured your point?” Hanzo asked.

“Affirmative, sweetheart.” McCree answered cheerfully.

“This is a _mission._ Address me appropriately.” Hanzo stressed.

“As you wish, Agent Sweetheart.”

Winston’s disapproving grunt could be heard next. “Agent Pharah. Have you accessed the databanks?”

“Currently en route. Keep making noise out there, it’s working.”

Mei’s first wall chose that moment to fall, its rumble alerting their group to ready themselves. Mei’s blaster and one of Hanzo’s scatter arrows took care of the first wave. Zenyatta sent a volley, Genji his stars.

When they broke past, it became a game of evading blaster beams and bullets, all the while slowly inching towards the main castle. Zenyatta lent his orb of harmony to whoever managed to get hit by a lucky shot.

A few minutes in, Hanzo barked, “Update?”

McCree’s voice crackled to life in his ear. “Uh, yeah. Ever notice how you come across somethin’ once in awhile you shouldn’t have messed with? That’s me right now.”

“I will literally pay you to shut up.” Fareeha begged.

“What’s wrong?” Winston asked.

Athena gave a frustrated huff. “It’s protected. I can’t get through.”

“And we kinda set off a countdown that’ll prolly alert every goon in the castle that we’re up here in about three minutes.”

“I only need one to access the files, a few more to download. I believe this was built for the use of a specific omnic, but I can probably override it with help. These access ports are very particular to what Omnica created.” Athena explained, “Zenyatta, how quickly can you get to Pharah and McCree’s position?”

Zenyatta turned to the brothers, who looked at each other. Genji made a gesture, Hanzo nodded.

Hanzo and Mei covered them as they rushed off, and the remaining goons shouted their movements into their earpieces. They took a side passage to the back of the castle, a drop-off overlooking the hill. Mei set a small wall to cover them, Genji paired with his master, and Hanzo helped Mei over. But whereas Genji and Zenyatta went through a stairwell heading up, Hanzo and Mei stalled at one that led down, and fired more shots when her wall fell.

It led to the main hall. Those heading the family were most likely in its bunker below ground with a retinue of their best on guard. He told Mei as much.

“So, should I freeze them?”

“No, we will go around and try to lure them out. We need to buy them time, and we would not survive facing them all together, just you and I.”

“I can blizzard them.” Mei hefted the fuel cell at her back, expression a little devilish.

Hanzo bit out a small laugh despite the situation. He shook his head and opened his mouth, then heard Genji through the comm.

“Hanzo!” his voice rang urgent, “We’re engaging! I’m covering Zenyatta, he’s almost there, but they’ve got-” his voice cut off in a scream. Behind it, he heard Zenyatta yell out his name, but Genji seemed to recover slightly, choking out, “Keep going! It’ll kill you, master, keep-” another scream, and this time Hanzo could hear the unmistakable crackle of an EMP shot. His blood ran cold.

“I’m headin’ down!” Jesse’s voice.

The family employed omnics. They had taken down several already in their infiltration. Surely the elders would not be so barbaric as to use such deadly tactics and risk their own men.

“They’ve taken him.” The monk’s voice was pained, the most upset that he had ever heard it. “They’ve taken Genji.”

“I hit ‘em with a flashbang, took down a few, but the ones with Genji were already gone. I can hear more comin’-”

Hanzo forced down his fear and made himself think. “Protect Zenyatta. Get those files. Mei.” He turned to look down at her, “Go back around and secure your wall at the garden. Keep them out for as long as you can.”

She nodded seriously and ran off. Hanzo took a deep breath, steeling himself. He walked down the stairs with Storm Bow at his back.

It had been months since he had been here last. The soft light of the lanterns lit the ancient room in a soft light, the air almost seemed peaceful. He did not expect to see the line of the family’s elders seated in a semi-circle on cushions on either side of Genji’s shrine. There were about twenty guards, a mix of man, woman, and omnic. They gave a start when he entered. Whispers of his name rose from their lips, rising in volume. As he suspected, word spread quickly and men rushed down from the stairwells to crowd in and watch the confrontation. Predictable. They stepped back as his feet carried him up the steps, past a lantern, directly in front of the stand bearing his sword.

_“Okaeri nasai.”_ The elders spoke in tandem. Weak, wheezing, grizzled voices converging into one.

_“Tadaima.”_ It came out on reflex, a knee-jerk reaction to a phrase so everyday he spoke it like breathing.  [13]

The sound of gunshots rang from above. Jesse. From outside came a heavy rumbling. Mei.

They took his bow and quiver. A group was sent off to deal with the intruders. But Hanzo saw them linger, too curious to hasten to do as ordered. The elders did not hold enough authority to incite fear when the master of the Shimada Clan had returned. His presence was buying time. The elders noticed, and frowned.

“We found the wreckage left by the dragons in one of our warehouses,” said one.

“We knew you were here,” said another.

“Have you come to kill us?”

It was all too easy to draw forward the lordly mask he had spent his childhood perfecting. He squared back his shoulders, looking down at them with as much contempt as he could muster. “No. I come for answers. You have resorted to making an alliance with a terrorist coup to maintain your standing, and now it is costing the Shimada-gumi our supporters. Tell me, how many have ceded their loyalty to Talon and no longer answer to you?”

They chose to answer his question with a question of their own, “Tell us, do you know what happened to the ones that remained loyal to you when you left?”

“You had them killed.” Hanzo replied easily. “A waste.”

“A necessary action to maintain order.”

“A rash decision made by weak minds and weaker wills.” he shot back coolly. He heard a quiet hum of approval around him.

“It’s done.” Athena said smoothly in his ear. “Files downloaded and transferring. I will forward our findings to Geneva. I read Genji’s lifesigns to be somewhere nearby. I am directing McCree towards his position.” Hanzo gave no indication he heard her.

“Your leadership is weak, but you are not thoughtless fools. You allowed Overwatch to get wind of our movements purposefully. You invited this attack, and caused the deaths of our men. Capable men. They fought and died honorably while you sat here and did nothing.” More approval from the peanut gallery.

“The events in Numbani were broadcast worldwide.” They replied.

“You saw my involvement.” Realization hit when one by one, the elders nodded. “Those that caved to Talon were never loyal. Those that stay remember their oaths. Talon knows this.”

The sugar skull told them to watch out.

“You are considered a very valuable asset by our new partners.” They confirmed.

“Talon wants a puppet to control, and they won’t waste their time on you. Not when they can have me.” He thought to the holding cells below the Watchpoint. “Another Widowmaker.”

The one at the end raised a wrinkled hand and beckoned someone forward with a finger while the other spoke. “Clever as ever, Shimada-dono. Do you see now? We led you here for your own good. They would have gotten to you eventually. They always get who they want. ”

He heard movement from one of the stairwells, the shuffling of footsteps, someone being dragged against their will. A sound of static. “You cannot expect me to come willingly.”

“We can. You will.”

_“Anija.”_

Hanzo turned to see his brother carried between two of the family, body limp, soot staining the chrome of his body and the smell of burnt wires permeating the area. Half human, an EMP wouldn’t kill him, not entirely. But he had taken two shots.

The fists at his side began to tremble. Fury rose to choke at his throat. He heard a small clink from up above.

Genji was forced onto his knees, the elders tittered, and Hanzo bit his tongue. He looked to them questioningly. “Yes, we know it is him. His identity was a gift from our new partners. To ensure a steady relationship.”

“You’re goin’ steady with Talon? Congratulations! When’s the wedding?” called a voice from above.

Hanzo looked up, his movement mirrored by the line of elders as every set of eyes in the room peered up to the rafters to see McCree lounging casually on the broad beams.

“Whoa there!” He winked, and that was all the warning Hanzo needed to brace himself for a flashbang. He shielded his eyes and heard McCree land heavily, raining bullets on those gathered. One that held Genji fell, but the other took cover, pointed a pulsing EMP blaster at Genji’s temple, an omnic risking suicide, screaming, _“YAMERO!”_ [14]

“Stop!” Hanzo yelled at McCree, arm flung outwards to ward off the men that had rushed forward to restrain him. At Hanzo’s command he stilled, taking his finger off Peacekeeper’s trigger much to the relief of the omnic he’d been aiming for.

The elders behind them didn’t even bat an eye. “If you came looking for the wraith, cowboy, you’ve just missed him. He and his associate have left.” one said.

“You cost us many men, the night of Obon. It will be a pleasure to deliver you to him, as a gesture of good faith.” said another.

“Again with that?” Jesse scratched at his head with the butt of his gun. “C’mon fellas, I’m sure we can settle this like civilized folks.” He quickly raised his hands to show surrender. Through the comm, Winston and Fareeha were arguing on how to best get them out.

They were surrounded. His bow was in the hands of an operative to McCree’s left. Soon, someone would think to take Peacekeeper. Hanzo turned to Genji and took on a tone he hadn’t used in years. “Did you do as I ordered? Were the others able to reach the objective?”

Genji’s mask remained on, green slit revealing nothing. “I don’t know.” he whispered.

Hanzo scoffed. “What do you mean, ‘you don’t know’?” He sliced at the air with his hand angrily. “Before you got yourself caught like the incompetent fool you are, did you do your duty?”

“Brother, I’m sorry. I--”

“Hey now,” McCree began, but Hanzo cut him off when he strode forward.

_Shin._

He brought himself to his full height, looming over his brother subjugate on the lacquered floor. “They think I will give myself up to save you, Genji. They think I will go back to being their puppet for your sake.” he turned his glare on the elders. He stalked forward, they shrank back. He gestured at Genji behind him as he stormed. “I meant to kill him! I did as you bid, I killed him for failing us!”

“Yet he is not dead.” They were losing their composure.

“Yes, you failed to check his corpse. But I do not regret it. He has proven useful. More useful alive and a bastardization of what he once was than dead. Do not assume to control me with a tool!”

_“Anija.”_ Genji’s voice wet with the blood seeping between the edges of his mask. Hanzo cast him a disinterested look, then looked away. Before him lay the altar, the bloodstained split scroll, the stand, his sword _._

_Zen._

He wrapped his right hand over the grip of the katana, his glove masking the feel of the frayed _tsukaito_ against his palm. He felt McCree shift his stance.

“I will not be controlled, especially not by a tool that has lost its usefulness.” He faced his brother, staring down at him coldly. The guards parted to give him room.

“You two-faced sonuvabitch.” McCree moved. He stood between him and the omnic holding Genji captive, leaving his back exposed to a gangster, his front exposed to a dragon. His gun drawn.

“Do not do your weapon or this hall a dishonor. I saw you shoot my men. You have no ammunition left. Don’t.” He ordered away those that had moved forward to aim their cannons at McCree with a wave of his hand. “He is not worth the effort.” Eyes back on the gunslinger, he barked, “Move, _Jesse_.”

McCree eyed the blade with a glint in his eye and Hanzo tightened his grip on the sword. Their gazes locked. He twirled Peacekeeper once, cocked it, aimed between his eyes. Everyone froze.

“Well, _Hanzo,_ I know what you’re thinking.” He took a step forward and the men surrounding them shifted back. “‘Did he fire six shots, or only five?’ Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement I kinda lost track. But bein’ as this is a .45 Colt, most powerful six-shooter in the world, would blow your head clean off, you’ve gotta ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky?” Jesse’s lips spread into a careless grin.

_Bi._

“Well, do ya, archer?”

His hand moved a centimeter. His finger left the trigger guard, and the bullet barely grazed the tip of Hanzo’s ear, blasting off a tuft of silver as he shot forward sword in hand, cutting down three men. Jesse’s bullet crumpled the man behind him, and he twisted, bringing the grip of his gun down hard on the one that held Genji, the small spur at its end trailing sparks as he fell, howling, clutching at his eye. McCree kicked away his EMP gun, dove to grab Genji before he hit the floor and tucked him beneath his right arm.

Hanzo reached the man that held Storm Bow who panicked and dropped them, screaming as he ran away. Hanzo shouldered his quiver, tossed his sword to Genji, pulled out three arrows, shooting them between the eyes of the lackeys that rushed forward, drawing their guns too late.

Genji caught the sword and pushed McCree off. He stood shakily and shouted, _“Ryūjin no ken o kurae!”_

The green dragon burst into life, flowing from the blade to devour the last of the Shimada-gumi that hadn’t fled when things began to go sour. But they put up a fight, Hanzo felt a bullet bounce off the plating on his knee, saw another raise their blaster to aim at his wounded brother. He was too far. He opened his mouth to yell a warning.

But McCree, eyes on the same threat, shot forward before the crackling blue light of energy burst forth. He shoved Genji out of harm’s way and was hit with the blast himself. He cursed, thrown onto his side on the wooden floor and clutching at his mechanical arm.

Hanzo sent a scatter arrow into their midst. The rest did as his arrow did, and scattered. He nocked another one and aimed it at the altar.

“If they continue to fight they will die. Order them to surrender!”

The elders stared at him impassively as their empire fell to pieces.

_“Taikyaku!”_ someone called from far off. Hanzo started, Winston would not be pleased if they allowed them all to escape. Mei’s voice came online. [15]

“Don’t worry Hanzo.”

“We will herd them into the garden,” Fareeha said, voice backed by the sound of explosions.

“Mei is awaiting at the top of the pagoda with her Snowball.” Zenyatta assured him calmly. Mei followed that up with a giggle. Hanzo felt immense relief that they were on the same side.   

_“Meirei ni shitagae!”_ he ordered the elders again. This time, they bowed their heads. Outside, a blizzard stormed in the heart of summer. They had won. [16]

Genji supported himself against a pillar and waved away a hovering Jesse. He raised a fist and offered it to Hanzo, who closed the distance between them to rap their knuckles together.  

“Nice acting. I always knew your dramatics would pay off someday.” Genji said.

“Yes. I learned that from my brother.” he smiled and backed away when Genji gasped, offended, and lunged at him. His body protested, already at its limit. His arms flailed, and something popped.

“Oh no, _chikusho,_ that’s my leg. I’m going down!” [17]

And down he went, until Jesse appeared out of nowhere to haul him up and over his shoulder.

“You two playin’ nice over here?”

He didn’t seem to believe them when they assured him they were. They looked to each other, Hanzo checking over his brother, Genji hoisted over Jesse’s right shoulder in a fireman’s carry. Jesse himself was smiling past the blood trickling from a cut on his brow. His left arm was smoking slightly, sparks coming off at the wrist while his fingers twitched.

_Shin. Zen. Bi._

* * *

 

The waters of Kuwaguchi lake sparkled in the late afternoon sun. Hanzo watched it glimmer, standing in the sand of its bank, the river to his left. Insects sang in the trees, the breeze rustled the grey sleeve of his _gi_ and moved onto the reeds growing by the water.

His head ached. Dealing with law enforcement had not been easy as a former yakuza boss, and it wasn’t easy now. Even if the interaction had been to assert Overwatch’s right to the castle, and to make sure the UN couldn’t seize it for their own purposes. In a sudden fit of passion, Genji had kicked Hanzo out, urging him to relax, telling him he would take care of the last of the legal work.

The castle was in both their names. It would remain so, even as it took on the title of Watchpoint Hanamura.

Overwatch’s probation period was nearly over. Winston had gratefully accepted the brothers’ proposal and extended their stay in Japan for a few days to finalize care of the castle until Overwatch could spare the funds and agents to occupy it.

Tomorrow they would return to Gibraltar.

Hanzo toed at a lump of driftwood and sighed. Watchpoint Hanamura, no longer Shimada-jo. He mourned his home even as he allowed Genji to sign it away. But he did not regret it.

The sound of spurs alerted him of company.

“It’s kinda aggressive, ain’t it?” said McCree, coming to a stop besides him. His arm was fully functional again, the result of a night spent with Mei and a toolbox. Zenyatta had cared for Genji. Hanzo had been useless.

“What is?”

“The water.”

“It’s a lake. The waves are not dangerous.”

“Now I know that, I ain’t a complete bumpkin. I meant the,” He wriggled his metal fingers over the line of the horizon, “Shininess.”

Hanzo took his eyes off the cowboy to consider the view before them. He was right. It shone with an intensity that was almost blinding.

_“Kira kira.”_ he whispered. Then, “What are you doing here? How did you find me?”

“You know Athena’s got trackers on all of us. Genji started gettin’ worried. He didn’t actually expect you to wander off for so long, swore you’d be back and cursin’ up a storm at how he hadn’t read clause such ‘n’ such close enough or somethin’.” He pulled out his handheld and input Genji’s contact name. The tone rang for a few seconds, and then Genji’s visor was visible on the screen. McCree flicked it up to make it a hologram. “Found him! He’s fine. He’s with me.”

“Oh good.” Genji seemed to be covering something behind him. Faint sounds of an argument came from the device, followed by an explosion. “Listen, _nī-chan?_ We have a situation.”

Hanzo pulled down McCree’s arm until he was at eye level with the hologram. “Are you under attack?”

“Uh, kind of? We’ve got it under control, but you.. may want to see this.” He flipped the camera and showed them a hole where a patch of the castle’s ceiling had been. Then he trailed it down and focused on a mountain of rubble.  

No. Not just rubble. Most of that mountain was a man. At his feet lay a scraggly pile of limbs that sat up to rub at its flaming head.    

“Well we’ve gone stepped in it now, huh, Roadie?” McCree and Hanzo exchanged a look, and their heads bumped together when they drew closer to look more carefully at the screen.

His head was literally on fire.

Genji closed in, his sword could be seen on the corner of the video feed. He brandished it in the face of the intruder that seemed to be conscious. The man, a downright filthy blond screamed and backed away, waving his arms frantically. The mountain sat up, revealing an enormous belly tattooed with the image of a pig. His face was covered by a gas mask, also pig-themed.

The smaller one spoke with his arms in the air. “Right right, we’re just passin’ through, no need to bring out them pointy ends!” Genji’s sword pressed against his neck. Mei had her blaster aimed at his large associate, should he decide to try and intervene. Pharah was suited up, with her cannon aimed at both of them. Zenyatta approached the scene curiously.

“Who are you?” Genji asked. “How did you get in here?”

He gave a crazed giggle, “Mate, believe me we wouldn’ta been ‘ere if we’da known ‘bout you!”  

The man in the porcine mask grunted. The blond one snapped his fingers and pointed as if he had made a valid comment. “Ha, yeah no, we prolly woulda! Right as always, Roadie!”

“Roadie?” asked Mei.

“Australians.” Fareeha groaned.

The blond one didn’t seem overly concerned about his present situation. He looked to Zenyatta and hooted. “Oi, mate! Yeah you, omnic arse with them floaty balls! Ha, floaty balls. Listen, do me a favor, wouldya?”

Zenyatta, who by design could only gaze upon someone coolly, gazed upon him coolly.

“What would you ask of me?”

“Well ya ain’t gon’ agree to get your kin offa me, but next best thing, right? Can you juggle?”

Next to him, McCree chuckled. Hanzo watched in rapture as the lights on Zenyatta’s forehead flickered in agitation. “I will not juggle.”

“What are you doing here? What do you want?” Genji asked. His blade drew the first hint of blood, and the large one growled a warning. The blond one raised his arms even higher.

“Treasure, mate! D’ya find it? Guy down the road got talk ‘bout a coupla dragons that lived ‘ere. Dragons got hoards, right? Tell ‘em I’m right, Roadie!”

Roadie did not tell them he was right.

“Roadie says I’m right.”

“Put us on speaker.” Hanzo spoke into the microphone. Genji did as told, and Hanzo spoke to the unlucky burglars, amused by the absurdity of the situation

“There is no treasure.”

The man pushed off Genji’s sword with two fingers and peered up at his mask. “What, sure there is! Look, let us off, scot-free, I’ll make it worth your while! We find it, we give you a cut, we never see each other again! How’s 70-30 sound to ya?”

Jesse snapped his fingers and pointed at the one on fire. “Hold on! I knew I recognized them from somewhere! Ain’t y’all the pair that pulled off that heist in Dorado!?”

“What? Who is that? Whoever you are, I’ve no idea what you’re on about!”

“Not us,” said the other one.

McCree went on thoughtfully. He started pacing. “We can just turn ‘em in for the bounty. Wouldn’t hurt, we could upgrade Athena’s servers. But see, you fellas are more than y’look if you can pull off a stunt like that.”

Hanzo watched him and didn’t interfere. They didn’t seem to be a threat, and he was frankly done with the responsibility of being team leader. His mission was complete. He’d let them deal with the Australians.  

He directed his attention back on the water as McCree paced the length of the shore. His voice lilted, carried by the wind, and Hanzo listened without really hearing. In the distance was the castle. If he squinted, Hanzo could make believe he saw the new hole in its roof.

He didn’t notice when Jesse hung up on the call and came back to stand at his side.

“Handed ‘em over to the local authorities. Not like they’re not gonna break out in a jiffy, but I got Genji to plant a trace on the lil’ one. But y’know Faree, stickler for the rules. She ‘n’ Angie are meant to be, I’m tellin’ ya… uh, archer?”

Hanzo flicked his eyes over to him, but looked back to the castle overlooking Hanamura. McCree readjusted his hat and followed his line of sight. He made a quiet noise of understanding.  

“You gonna be sad? Leavin’ home?” he asked softly.

Hanzo shook his head. Flipped the driftwood over with his foot. “This was once my home. No longer.”

“That so? Well then, what’s home like for ya, archer?”

His mind flashed to limestone cliffs, but instead he described the scene before them with all the nostalgia of his adult life. “A village high atop a hill. There are cherry blossoms in the spring. I miss it, dearly.”

The man next to him gave a low whistle. “Sounds real nice. I’d like to go there sometime.”

Hanzo hummed. The wind chose that moment to pick up, buffeting his _gi_ and forcing McCree to clutch his hat. McCree leaned back and picked a spot of grime from the corner of his eye, smeared it on his jeans. Reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out one of his cigarillos. Hanzo remembered a conversation on a rooftop, the taste of peach against his tongue.

“The other day, during the mission. Did you… was there a moment where you doubted me?”

Jesse had his hand cupped over his mouth, protecting the ember he’d just managed to light from the wind as he dragged in a long inhale and let it out in a thin trail of smoke. “Honestly? Yes. But just for a second. You’re good, _Hanzo,_ but not that good. I know when someone’s lyin’. And you? You ain’t been one for lyin’ in all the time I’ve known ya.” He trailed off, mouth parted slightly around the width of the cigarillo. Smoke spilled out into the open air. “And I like to think I do. Know you, I mean.”

“I see.” he answered quietly, but McCree went on.

“Which leads me to another thing.” He yanked his vice from his lips and used it to point at him. “As well as I think I’ve gotten to know you, and lemme tell you, it’s been a privilege... I don’t actually know much about you.”

Hanzo took the cigarillo from his fingers and examined it. “That is easily remedied. What would you like to know?”

“Oh I dunno. What’s your favorite color? Do ya like a music? Wait, no, ‘course you do. Nevermind that you ‘n’ Lulu get on like a house on fire. I get that he’s talented, but I never pegged you as one for rap until he teamed up with that girl from Trinidad in that one song and you just about lost your mind.”

Hanzo was unsure which to answer first. He wasn’t even sure if an answer was still required. He reached up to place the cigarillo back between his lips and responded nonetheless, “Yellow. I like yellow.”

Jesse nodded at the information, puffing out another cloud of smoke, “Like your scarf.” he whispered thoughtfully. Then he asked more definitively, “What’s your favorite song?”

“You already know it.” A faint blush rose at the memory, the dejection that had driven him to sing it that night a little over a month ago. “I Look Up As I Walk.”

Jesse watched the water lap the sand of the shore. Quietly, then gaining volume as he went, he hummed the chorus of the song. Was it possible for the breadth of the beauty of someone’s voice to transfer into a simple hum? At its end, he dropped his voice to a whisper. “That old ditty?”

Hanzo let out the breath caught in his throat. “Yes. I’m impressed you remember it still.”

The cigarillo smothered his chuckle, “Don’t be. It’s in Spanish. English, too. Y’know, we don’t call it… what is it? In Japanese?”

_“Ue o muite arukou.”_

“Yeah, that. We call it ‘Sukiyaki’.”

“Suki-” he cut himself off incredulously. “That’s food!”  

“Well, yeah--”

“What was wrong with naming it the direct translation!?”

He shrugged, unconcerned. “Reckon it wasn’t pretty enough. And it ain’t like you can expect Americans to be able to pronounce _ue wo maite--_ what was it again?”

Hanzo exhaled, long and drawn out enough to be a sigh. “Typical of Americans to take something beautiful and ruin it in their laziness.”

The cowboy tore his gaze from the water to cross his arms and face him. “Wuh? Now excuse me, if you think I’m just gonna stand here and let you trash talk my country--”

“--Whose flag you have printed on one of your _sarapes._ Cheap and tasteless.”

“Them’s fightin’ words, Shimada-san!”

“Your country is the epitome of tackiness.” Hanzo said, smug. Jesse just sputtered at him.

“And here is a prime example,” Hanzo smirked and gestured at his attire. Jesse smacked his hand away as a disbelieving laugh bubbled out of his throat. He put out the cigarillo on the heel of his boot, pocketing it for later use.

“Oh you’re askin’ for it! Now you listen here, Hanzo--”

Hanzo watched him as he yelled without bite, like a wronged child. Puffing his cheeks, indignant and determined to make his point.

Foolishness was in the air again. It was in the sound of the cicadas in the trees, the scent of smoke in the wind, the sigh of the river swelling with summer rain. The filtered rays of sunlight shining gold through wispy clouds over green hills. The sound of his voice, the sound of his laugh. The sound of peace. In that moment the world tilted, and Hanzo felt something shift into place.

A moment in the restless summer air, accompanied by restless hands, restless thoughts.

_Shin. To trust, and know that trust is returned._

He interrupted McCree by leaning forward and up, rising to the tips of his toes to cup McCree’s face between his thumb and forefinger, squishing at his cheeks to pucker his lips and stop his mouth from running.

“Wuh?” McCree said intelligently, completely taken aback. He looked ridiculous, and Hanzo’s heart was full to bursting.

_“Ki ga kuruisōda.”_ 　he breathed, tilting his head slightly, looking up at him through his lashes. Everything was in place to get this right, to pull close the space he had purposefully put between them. Still, he hesitated.[18]

_Zen. Don’t think. Act._

He rose to the highest point his height offered and pressed his lips against the ones he held captive.

It only lasted for a second, and then he pulled away and planted both feet firmly on the ground. But that second was long enough for McCree’s eyes to widen comically large and blink down owlishly at him. He withdrew his hand hastily, running his fingertips along his thumb, relishing in the memory of warm scruffy cheeks.

Jesse didn’t react. He just gaped at him, slack jawed.

“Jesse?”

His mouth snapped shut, but he didn’t stop giving Hanzo that baffled expression. Then he blinked, and his expression changed, hardened, determined.

Hanzo faltered. Perhaps he shouldn’t have done it so suddenly, brazenly, without permission. Assuming he would reciprocate. Out in the open, too. He cast a quick look around as he stammered out an apology.

_“Iwazumogana no koto o-”_ [19]

Hanzo didn’t like being interrupted. He didn’t mind it now.

A hand reached out to jerk his face forward again, the action quick and rough.

Then gentle.

_Bi. Finding clarity._

Before he registered the lips back against his own, he felt the warmth of an arm wrapping around his waist, metal fingers sliding from his cheek to the back of his neck. His chest pressed against the hardness of bronze body armor, pulled forward and held there while McCree coaxed his lips open with his own. His mouth flooded with the taste of smoke, and he felt warmth. Warmth embodied in the press of lips and the scrape of his beard and the feel of his hair twisted in between his fingers. He felt the scarf flutter down his back and land in a pool at his ankles.

He reached out and let himself touch. He let his thumb graze against the stubble beneath his jaw as their lips slid together perfectly, effortlessly. His other hand tucked up to curl around the muscle of a bicep just above metal warmed by the sun. The sun, the heat of his mouth, the velvet of tongue sliding against his own. He was overwhelmed with an urgency to get closer.

Because close wasn’t close enough. Jesse’s body was solid and strong but being vertical was too much of an obstacle when all Hanzo wanted in that moment was to push forward and _take._ Take as Jesse was taking his breath, his conscious thought, in the way he broke away only long enough to look at him, marveling. To whisper the word _‘sweetheart’_ at him reverently, then steal back down for another kiss, nevermind that he half had to hold Hanzo up when tiptoeing paired with the damned pet name weakened his knees.

The arm at his waist gripped tighter, fingers bunched in the silken fabric of his _gi_ , and Jesse pushed forward. Hanzo pushed back. Soft became fierce, teeth bit at his bottom lip, Hanzo retaliated by forcibly parting his mouth again to fuck his tongue in deep, winning himself a choked off little moan from the taller man. But Jesse’s height paired with his strength won out, and this time when he pushed, Hanzo couldn’t help the squeak that escaped him when his spine arched back and he was thrown off balance. He clung onto broad shoulders to keep from falling on the wet sand, then scrambled to stand by himself when Jesse straightened up.  

“Whoa there, sorry. M’sorry,” Jesse muttered, voice rough and husky as he pulled back. The sound of it sent a jolt down to his toes. “Know you hate it when I cut you off but, I uh, I had to.” He laughed sheepishly. Then he reached out to brush back the curtain of hair that had fallen across his face. “You were sayin’?”

The dragons coiled and preened beneath the barrier of his skin. His mind melted, useless. The only thought that crossed his mind was that Genji would be insufferable if he ever found out that Hanzo had followed his advice. And that it had paid off.

“Genji told me to-” Hanzo clamped his mouth shut too late, it came out before he could stop it.

Jesse looked down at him like he had grown a second head. “Genji what now?”

“I meant, he… _ā shimatta.”_ [20]

* * *

 

On the flight back to Gibraltar, Hanzo entertained himself by gazing idly out the transport windows. The day was clear, the sky bright and blue and endless. He spotted a cloud in the distance that looked like a cowboy hat.

McCree sat with Fareeha in the cockpit again, and Genji had gone to nose into their business. Mei and Zenyatta were sitting together towards the front, talking quietly in Mandarin. Mei’s Snowball buzzed through the air, often coming to settle in the empty seat next to his, no doubt ordered there by its creator.

He read through an update sent out by Winston about a mission to Siberia on his handheld. It was relatively short notice, they would only have a couple of weeks to prepare. Both he and Genji were on the roster. They would get the opportunity to fight together another day.

His hand wrapped around Storm Bow on his lap. The feeling of holding his sword again had faded from his palm. The dragons rested peacefully.

“I’m curious. Why won’t McCree look me in the eye today?”

Hanzo looked up and took in the sight of Genji making his way towards him around crates without his faceplate on. Far behind him, the door to the cockpit slid shut. He blinked. He looked back down at his phone.

“Ooookay. I’m curious. Why won’t _you_ look me in the eye today?” Genji nudged Snowball aside and sat down. He scrolled down the screen of his handheld without reading anything.

“I followed your advice.” Hanzo said plainly. It was the most tactful way he could come up with to confess what he’d done. He’d have to admit to it sooner or later.  

“You- ” Genji was shocked into silence. “Really? About…?” He let the implication hang between them while he made a rolling hand gesture. Hanzo nodded. _”Nani shita no? Nani itta no?_ No, no! Don’t tell me! I bet I can guess!” He stood and bounced excitedly on the balls of his feet. [21]

“Genji…” His warning went ignored.

_"Makkurī, zutto issho ni itai!”_ Genji somehow managed to lower his voice to match Hanzo’s pitch while making himself sound like a teenaged girl. He cast a look over to the other end of the transport, where Mei and Zenyatta had looked up. [22]

_"Sonna ōkina koe o dasu na!”_ he hissed. Genji disregarded him.

_"Are, chigau? Dō ka na…  Makkurī dai suki!”_

_"Genji, yamero!”_

_“Aishiteru?”_

_"Shinken ni yatte yo!”_ [23]

“Did you call him Jesse-kun?” Genji giggled. A full grown man had no right to be giggling as delightedly as Genji was. “McCree-nyan?” A full-on guffaw. Hanzo cursed him and stood to head for where Mei and Zenyatta sat, trying and failing to look disinterested in Genji’s outburst. Mei was staring down at her communicator’s screen, typing too determinedly to be sincere.

Genji gave chase, “No, _matte, matte yo!”_ he held out a hand to stop Hanzo, struggling for breath. [24]

Then the transport gave a sudden jerk and Hanzo had to brace himself against the wall to keep from tipping over. Mei moved over to offer the spot next to her, so he ran forward and took it. A _ping_ came from overhead to announce that their pilot had a message.

“I advise everyone to get strapped in. We’ve run into some unexpected turbulence, and I- no, _ahk,_ I’m not going to- give me!-”

Out of the speakers came McCree’s triumphant laugh. “Fasten your seatbelts, no, _no,_ wait! Saddle up, y’all! It’s gonna be a bumpy ride!”

_“THAT’S NOT EVEN EASTWOOD!”_

_“I COULDN’T THINK OF ONE, FAREE, BITE ME!”_

His taunt was followed by the sound of a scuffle, a growl, then a yelp. The transport tipped dangerously.

Hanzo winced and held on, Mei beamed, Zenyatta gave what could be considered a laugh, and Genji’s grin couldn’t eat more shit even if it wanted to. Hanzo hoped that would be the end of it.

Unfortunately, his new company did not offer respite from Genji’s teasing.

Zenyatta looked to his student, and then at Hanzo, then to the overhead speakers. He broke the silence. _“Tekī ni kawatte aijō ga umaremashita, ne?”_ [25]

Hanzo groaned as Genji gave a delighted whoop and raced forward with an arm extended to receive a high five from his teacher. Mei sympathetically patted his thigh and muttered, _“Kawaisou.”_ [26]

When they finally landed, the lowering transport walkway opened to the sight of a cheerful Lena standing next to Winston. She blinked forward to hug the hull of the ship and croon about how much she had missed it. Reinhardt came barreling out of the Watchpoint with Torbjörn in tow to shout his welcome. Dr. Ziegler and Lúcio waved from the medbay windows. Satya was no doubt down in the labs.

Hanzo felt unexpected relief wash over him. He was suddenly shoved forward as McCree raced past him, _sarape_ flapping behind him and hollering an apology with Fareeha hot on his heels.

Genji stopped next to him and bumped their hips together.

_“Okaeri.”_ Genji said softly. Hanzo looked to limestone cliffs, to the sea, and the line of the horizon.

_“Tadaima.”_ [27]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOUSTON, WE HAVE LIFTOFF! yo i just got over the worst fuckin case of writer’s block so apologies for the wait. if like. u were waiting.  
> Also, speaking of apologies! Just thought I’d let y’all know: thanks to a v nice anon on tumblr it was brought to my attention that I had been writing Jesse as referring to Lucio (an adult black man) as “boy” and “kid” and that’s disrespectful as all heck. I’m sorry. I went back and changed it all, apologies if I offended.  
> I consider this the closing to Hanzo’s arc. I’ve spent a lot of time and effort on the boy with the dragon tattoo, and now I’m moving onto mi hijo. Cuz I’m ~h a l f w a y t h e r e~ so be ready for the brunt of the entirety of my affection towards McCree.  
> Hope 2017’s been treating you well! Have a good one!
> 
> Translations:
> 
> [0]I’m boooored!  
> [1]Welcome home!  
> [2]I’m home  
> [3]Hot, isn’t it?  
> [4]Here bro, halfsies  
> [5]Gen:Do you remember mother’s stories?  
> Han: Of course.  
> Gen:Right. Dad was poor.  
> [6]Stop.  
> [7]Do not confuse love and desire.  
> [8]If there’s a hole, I would like to fall into it (hoping the ground would swallow you)  
> [9]For example  
> [10]About tomorrow...  
> [11]Ice wall rise up!  
> [12]Thanks!  
> [13]Welcome home, I’m home.  
> [14]STOP!  
> [15]Retreat!  
> [16]Obey me!  
> [17]I’m yellin’ timberrrr… No but really it means ‘damn’  
> [18]I’m out of my mind.  
> [19]I shouldn’t have done that.  
> [20]Oh, crap.  
> [21]What did you do? What did you say?  
> [22]McCree, I want to be with you forever!  
> [23]Han: Stop speaking so loudly!  
> Gen: What, wrong? How about… McCree, I really like you!  
> Han: Genji, stop it!  
> Gen: I love you?  
> Han: I’m serious!  
> [24]No, wait! Wait!  
> [25]So, hostility was replaced by love, was it?  
> [26]Poor thing  
> [27]Gen: Welcome home.  
> Han: I’m home.
> 
> And as always, I love and appreciate ALL your feedback and wonderful comments, so thank you!  
> Hit me up on tumblr if you wanna, I’m [ cantodelcolibri](https://cantodelcolibri.tumblr.com/)


	13. Vestida de Blanco

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a CALL OUT that is CALLING OUT [ halohampster](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Halohampster/pseuds/Halohampster) who kept me from writing because she felt it necessary to dump me back into One Piece hell. thank you ilu
> 
> See end notes for translations someone stop me I went overboard again and hover on pc for kanji

When he closes his eyes, he hears him.

_“Oye ingrato!”_ [0]

When he closes his eyes, he sees him. A ghost clad in grey camos and a dark hoodie, hand clutching at a worn beanie stained with blood. All rough edges and sharp words, fist swinging down to slam against the scratched metal of an interrogation table.

_“Te estoy hablando! No me digas que resultaste un cobarde, cabrón!”_ [1]

Jesse flinches back reflexively, but stares up defiantly, an ugly grimace twisting his split lip. There’s blood on his face, but not as much as the curly haired asshole glaring down at him has oozing from the clotting wound on his temple. Proof of what a worthless shot Jesse is. An inch to the right and he would have gotten away.  

In retrospect, Jesse’s never been gladder to have a bullet stray. Gritty dull walls melt away to the sleek shininess of Watchpoint Grand Mesa. The halls are sterile and grey, lit by harsh fluorescent light bulbs that flicker obnoxiously while Reyes is talking his ear off, going on about reports and something Morrison’s been nagging him about. Jesse squints his eyes and scowls up at the lights to avoid scowling at his commander. A younger version of himself, gangly limbs only just beginning to fill out with muscle now that the organization’s doctors have him on some new diet to correct his malnutrition.

_“Que rayos comías en ese desierto? La arena?”_ Gabriel Reyes smacks his chest with a stack of papers held by a clipboard and ushers him into the mess hall, his hand large and warm and comforting against his back.[2]

Jesse takes the clipboard and laughs, _“Tragas arena nomas cuando pierdes, jefe. Yo nunca perdi.”_ [3]

Gabriel freezes. Jesse only realizes something’s wrong when he takes another step forward and the warmth of his hand abandons him. He freezes too, backtracking. What did he say? What did he do, did his answer sound mocking? He turns around quickly, clutching the clipboard to his chest, shoulders drawn in, trying to appear smaller. His apology dies in his throat.

Gabriel’s smile outshines the sun. He’s looking down at him, something soft that looks a lot like pride shining in his eyes. “You laughed.” he says in wonderment. A different sort of fear grips Jesse, and his face shows it.

Reyes’ smile falters, he takes in Jesse’s expression and concern takes its place. _“Que tienes, mijo? Que pasa?”_ [4]

Jesse schools his features to something nonchalant and starts walking again. “Don’t call me that.” he grumbles just to be contrary. “I ain’t your son.”

All he does is earn himself a condescending laugh. “Yeah? _Pues que lastima mijito, te vas a tener que aguantar.”_ [5]

The mess hall is loud. Fareeha’s back from Canada, and she’s swinging on Reinhardt’s bicep, legs flailing and threatening to hit one of Torbjörn’s kids as they line up to take their turn. Ana and Morrison are looking harried in a sea of new recruits brandishing completed paperwork. Jesse turns away to take a tray of food from the line and finds himself facing a wide stretch of desert.

A craggy cliff in the gorge bathes him in shadow, a blessed respite from the heat. His mother’s gun is a familiar weight against his hip. He’s antsy, restless, so he checks his ammo belt, counts his flashbangs, and reads over their plan when Gabe walks over to him and bumps their shoulders. They’re almost the same height now.

“What’s eatin’ ya, kid?”

“Ain’t a kid.” Legally, it’s true. He wouldn’t be on the op if it weren’t.

“What’s eating ya, _hombre?”_ The asshole almost makes it sound like an insult. Jesse scowls at him, digging the heel of his boot into the cracked sandy ground. [6]

“Nothin’. Just don’t like bein’ back here is all.”

Gabriel considers him. The clouds shift and the sun shines bright, right on his bald head. Jesse considers cracking a joke about eggs. Gabe seems to read his mind because he puts out a finger before pulling on his beanie. _“Mira Jessito_ , you know Deadlock Gorge better than anyone. If we’re taking these assholes down, I need your head in the game. I need you here.” [7]

“No you don’t.” He protests and doesn’t let Gabe cut him off, “No, Gabe. I know what they’re sayin’, the folks back h--” _home,_ “-at base. They think I ain’t gonna do it, that I’ll turn tail ‘n’ run, or worse, stab y’all in the back. You already got what you need outta me. You got it outta me when you got me. Y’don’t need me here, Gabe. You’re givin’ yerself hell havin’ me on the op.”  

Whatever he says in response is lost in the sound of gunfire. The canyon remains empty, but Jesse hears the chaos, clear as the sky above.

Then the sky turns black, and Deadlock Gorge is gone. Now he can see the bright flash of cannon beams cutting through throngs of omnic bodies. Screams fill the filtered air of the São Paulo Omnium, and Jesse escorts a group of civilians away from the danger zone, shaking his head urgently when they point at his arm in concern. It’s bleeding bad, but not so bad he has to call for help.

Wait, his arm is bleeding. His left arm is bleeding. That wasn’t right. Why wasn’t that right?

Jack’s leading the Overwatch strike team to do damage control above ground. Jesse sends a silent prayer to whatever god’s listening to ask they watch over their angel as she does her job to help the wounded. Angela’s on the ground, and Jesse’s worried sick.

“McCree, report!” says Commander Reyes’ voice in his ear.  

“This’s McCree, got Block C cleared out and covered. Regrouping with Alvarez and Clarke in A.” The depth of his own voice throws him off for a second. He heads down a set of hallways silently, pressed to the wall with Peacekeeper held to his side.   

Controlled explosions, that’s what Blackwatch is there to set up. Overwatch can’t be held accountable for the inevitable loss of life, and the world can’t afford this omnium remaining active. How it turned back on, they didn’t fuckin’ know, but with Blackwatch the going is usually ‘shoot first, ask questions if they survive, then shoot again’.

It’s either they blow the production line, or the omnics blow the fusion core and they’re left with a nice crater where the city used to be.

Reyes is waving them down a narrow passage along a caved in wall. Suddenly they’re outside, and Reyes has the detonator in his hand. Clarke and Nkozi are jogging up to them, blasters held in front of them. They confirm they’ve finished planting their explosives when McCree sees movement coming from the rubble of a nearby building done in by a drone strike.

An omnic. Yellow-eyed, and somehow managing to look despairing despite a lack of facial features capable of expressing emotion.

A civilian, then.

“Hey-” Jesse starts forward, then Clarke gets trigger happy and the omnic crumbles with a line of bullets between the fading glow of their eyes. Jesse falters with his left hand outstretched towards the corpse, he feels the heat of the explosion Reyes no doubt just triggered. Suddenly he’s in front of Clarke, knocking the gun from his hand and shoving him to the ground. He’s yelling, and Nkozi’s trying to keep him from kicking the bastard’s head in.

“McCree! Stop!” He’s trying to calm him down, but all Jesse sees is red.

“What the fuck?!” Clarke’s got blood all over his face, a hand coming up to stem the flow, “You fuckin’ broke my nose!” Alvarez leans down to help him up, but he pushes her off.

“Why’d you shoot ‘em?!” He fights against Nkozi’s strong grip.

“It was just a fuckin’ omnic, man! Fuck!” he spits out a glob of blood. “Reyes! Get your bitch under control!”

“They weren’t infected! You’da known that if you had eyes sittin’ in that thick skull of yours, you fuckin’-” He stops when Gabe’s hands join in pulling him back.

“This ain’t the time, we’ve got to move. Write it in your report, I’ll see to it.”

“No you won’t. This’ll get swept aside like all the rest, citing ‘self defense’ and shit.”

“Oh yeah? _Y tu, muy valiente, que te ganas por armar arguende?”_ [8]

Jesse shoves him off but lays off of Clarke. “Justice ain’t gonna dispense itself.”

Gabriel laughs at him, a little mean. He shakes his head. “Fuck. Maybe I should let Jack have you. Spouting one-liners like that.”

Jesse’s about to tell him to shove it where the sun don’t shine when they hear a high-pitched grating sound. Metal screaming against metal. They all turn back to the wreckage of the omnium, where from the smoke come dots of red.

_‘Step right up.’_ croons Ana Amari’s voice in his head and Jesse pulls out his gun. Gabriel springs into action, radioing the Overwatch crew that they’re not in the clear and they’re engaging.

“How did they survive the blast?!” Alvarez is shouting, returning fire with her blaster. They all run for cover. Gabe pulls Jesse the rest of the way down behind the rubble of a building. Nkozi throws a grenade, and they duck down to weather the blast. They both abandon cover for a moment to return fire while the omnics that remain recover.

Gabe, always slow at reloading, kneels for a second to pull out a new clip. Alvarez and Nkozi are retreating. Jesse shoots with pinpoint accuracy and watches Clarke toss another grenade.

But omnics are omnics. They learn.

One catches the explosive and hurls it at them. Jesse watches its arc drawing closer. Gabe stands back up.

“Shit. Gabe!” he lunges forward, arm outstretched, unthinking. Then the world’s too bright, too much.

Too dark, then nothing.

 

 

There’s ringing in his ears. Endless, annoying-as-hell ringing. Most of him feels on fire, and his arm is numb. He cracks open his eyes and sees Gabe immediately, hovering over him, bleeding and covered in burns.

His lips are moving, Jesse concentrates on that as he clenches his teeth past the pain. He has one finger to his ear, and Jesse can almost make out what he’s saying by the shape of his mouth. _‘Jackie’_ , then, _‘Angela’_. He catches Jesse looking, and his eyes widen. He tries to sit up, shake the ringing from his head, but Gabe’s hands push him down against the ground.

_‘Don’t move.’_ his lips say, paired with terrified eyes. What the hell spooked Gabriel Reyes?

He sees fire licking into the evening sky in front of them. The rest of the team is standing around, Alvarez is messing with the medkit to his left, Clarke looks somewhat gleeful, Nkozi’s dark eyes are wide. Jesse grunts, ignores Gabe’s orders and pushes his hands off his chest to sit up.

Or at least he tries to.

He doesn’t have an arm to push him away with.

* * *

 

Jesse McCree’s eyes snapped open, body two steps ahead of his mind. His arm lashed out and dented the wall, then his skull banged against the metal frame of his headboard when he came to with a jolt. He sat up, nails bending against unforgiving metal, clutching at what should have been air, should be bloodied, _gone, gone, but Gabe’s alive, he’s alive, you saved him, he-_

No.

No, Gabriel Reyes was dead.

He immediately turned to his side, dry heaving into the wastebasket conveniently kept at the side of his bed.

He spat out bile, ran a deceptively warm metal hand through his bangs hanging limp with sweat, and squinted up to check the time.

The alarm clock on his bedside table read 0332.

_“Maldita sea.”_ he cursed, wiped his mouth and hung there, half on his bed, torso mostly off it, flesh hand braced on the tile floor. He stared at the dull gunmetal of his hand while his mind tried to tell him he was still in São Paulo, still feeling burns long since healed, fire all around, a flash of white so bright it blinded him and he can’t see. He can’t see, there’s buzzing in his ears, shots being fired, heart beating too fast, everything’s so _fast,_ he can’t _breathe._ [9]

“W-watc-” he sucked in a breath that caught in his throat. He coughed it out and tried again. “Watchpoi- Watchpoint Gibraltar, year 2060- no, 70-, no!” He flopped back on the bed properly, still breathing too fast, still seeing hell. “ _Andale, Jessito. Tu puedes. Estas aqui. Estas aqui, estas bien,_ you’re here, you’re okay. Okay. Watchpoint Gibraltar. Year 2076. September, fuck what day is it?”[10]  

It was bad enough when he dreamt of Deadlock and hellfire. Dreams of Jack or Ana just left him feeling morose and regretful. His parents were ghosts Jesse had long since buried along with his name, but Gabe-

The retreating back in his mind’s eye flashed between military green and Blackwatch grey.

There was a more than half-finished bottle of whiskey under the mess of his bed. After some difficulty, he managed to locate it and unscrew the top with shaky fingers. The fire that burned down his throat was a pathetic replacement for the warmth he sorely craved.

Warmth embodied in the comfort of another person, a body to hold, to ground him, to stay with him. But Jesse McCree was a mess of a human being, and he was alone.

_Alone, always alone, no one wants you, no one cares enough to stay, no one stays alive long enough to try._

Humans weren’t meant to be solitary creatures. But humans were creatures of habit, and he had spent years alone in the desert. A few months of kindness and warmth didn’t undo half a decade of damage.

Warmth embodied in the press of lips, a yellow scarf, silken hair threaded between his fingers.

Warmth sleeping in the next hall over. He downed the rest of the whiskey and tried to fall back asleep.

* * *

 

There was sunshine streaming through the blinds. Jesse groaned and turned, hiding beneath his covers. But soon enough, he resurfaced for air and to glare at the gall nature had to wake him up so rudely.

The sunlight just twinkled cheerfully, dust dancing in its rays. Jesse grunted and sat up, but the movement was just a bit too fast, and he clutched his head to keep the world from lurching. Sleep deprivation paired with a hangover.

Good fuckin’ morning.

He peeked out at the alarm clock from in between his fingers. 1226. Okay, maybe not morning. He resigned himself to a missed breakfast and swung his feet onto the ground to stand up. He dragged himself to the bathroom, but kept the light off. It was small enough he didn’t need it, and he wasn’t planning on shaving. The shower was turned on, toilet lid flipped, and steam quickly began filling the cramped space while he took care of business. The sleeve of his t-shirt caught on his arm like it always did, and he nearly tripped on his boxers as he tried to kick them off before stepping into the shower.

There was comfort in the monotony of routine.

About half an hour later he stepped out of his room into the empty dorm hallway of the Watchpoint. No one in sight, and no sound of life. He started for the kitchen, intent on snagging himself leftovers from last night to settle his stomach. Mei’s door near the end was slid wide open, but no sounds came from within.

When he passed it he waved in greeting, then did a double take and rushed into the room.

Mei sat at her desk beaming while Hanzo stood at the foot of her bed, turning something big, brown, and furry in his hands. Jesse had excitedly thought it was a dog, but closer inspection proved it was a wolf’s head, growling and vicious and angry. Hanzo looked like Christmas had just come early.

“What in the heck?” he said, breaking the odd silent spell in his head and in the room. Mei finally turned to look at him.

“McCree! Hanzo, show him! Show him!” She insisted, bouncing out of her seat to rush forward and gather Jesse’s hands in hers. She led him to Hanzo and what he was quickly beginning to realize was some sort of costume.

“Bit early for Halloween, ain’t it?” he asked.

“It’s…” Hanzo trailed off, not even turning to look at him. All of his attention was on the snarling maw of the wolf.

“It’s for the mission!” Mei gushed. “I found an old sewing machine down in storage!” Jesse smiled past the punch to the gut that hit him at another reminder of Gabe. “When Hanzo told me that story about the lone wolf on the mountain, and Winston announced the Siberia mission- Look, Hanzo, frostbite is serious and I took your weapons into consideration! I even had Winston help me make the plating for your legs-”

She kept rambling, and suddenly she was insisting he model the thing to make sure there was nothing she needed to fix. She stood to the side to let Hanzo shuffle over to her bathroom. The door slid shut behind him and she immediately turned to him.

“And for you--”

Jesse raised both hands to try and ward her off. “Now Miss Zhou, I love you dearly but I’d sooner--”

“Don’t worry,” she giggled. “I did not make you one.”  

Jesse sighed in relief. “Then what?”

Mei didn’t answer. She waited until the muffled sounds of Hanzo puttering around the bathroom slowly died down. “Well, I thought it might be enough repayment to give you the opportunity to see him dressed like…” She trailed off when the lock to the bathroom clicked off. Hanzo stepped back into the main room, clad in fur and artfully stylized red armor. The wolf’s head served as a hood pulled over his head. His scowl was more for show than out of honest displeasure.

_“Awoo.”_ Mei mock-howled softly. Jesse choked on his own spit.

* * *

 

To prepare for the mission to Volskaya Industries, Winston spent weeks running the Siberia team ragged in the ranges. A few of them did not have much experience fighting omnics in the numbers Russia was experiencing thanks to their fledgling outbreak. Once the Hanamura team landed, those assigned to Siberia had hit the ground running.

As a result, Jesse had hardly seen hair nor hide of the archer in a few long, endless weeks outside of their regular target practice sessions. And he couldn’t get handsy there either, since they had both taken Mei under their tutelage to improve her aim.

Forget handsy. They’d hardly even _talked._

Hanzo and Mei were devoted to improving themselves, with Lena and Genji a close second on hours logged in the ranges. Angela worried as was her habit, and Torbjörn went on about the Russian bodybuilder he had met on his travels before recall.

“D’ya ever go home to your wife, Torby? We ever gonna see any more blond heads runnin’ ‘round the base?” Jesse asked, dodging fire from his turret. Today was the last day to drill in formations, and those that weren’t going on the mission teamed up with the training dummies to fight against the Siberia team. Tomorrow at noon Lena would fly them out to Volskaya.

“After the last few nearly lost their fingers? Ha! No. She’d murder me. I went home, yes. Already sent in a request to get some time off come Christmas.”

“Agents, please refrain from switching onto the enemies’ comm line.” Athena scolded them.  

“MAY I JOIN YOU, MY FRIEND?” Reinhardt yelled, charging in to cover McCree as he shot down the offending turret.

“My baby!” Torbjörn immediately protested, no longer on the line, but his voice could be heard from atop a roof. McCree high-fived Reinhardt, shaking it off after the slap nearly sent him tumbling. He ran, avoiding the area where Tracer and Winston were facing off, both yelling taunts riddled in laughter. He shot at Genji descending from above, then rolled out of the way when Pharah engaged him instead. Lúcio skated up to bathe her in his energizing music, and Mercy appeared to tether Genji with a damage boost. Fareeha cried treachery and Angie laughed, bright and bell-like.

Pharah took to the skies, and Mercy gave a shriek and flitted away. Genji went to help Winston, so Lúcio turned his attention to the new turret Torbjörn and his hammer had just abandoned. Its cannon barrel turned to target Winston, and Lúcio raised his amplifier just as Symmetra came running into range, her projector’s petals forming an energy ball.

She shot, and it rode Lúcio’s soundwave, together taking down the accursed turret in one hit.

“I worked hard on that!” came Torbjörn’s scream. Lúcio whooped in joyed disbelief, then turned to offer Satya a high-five before remembering himself and skating away. She watched him go with pursed lips. Jesse shook his head and kept running.

Two of the training dummies flanked him when he turned into a mock alleyway to shoot at Mei before she could make him an icicle. She pouted and called for Angela to heal her with red paint staining the fur at her chest. He could see Genji’s green flash approaching from behind her.

Then the alleyway exploded in quick beams of light. Jesse stopped dead in his tracks as scatter arrows took down the two bots next to him, but left him unscathed. Genji considered him for a moment, shrugged, then leaped away. He thumbed at his comm until settling on Hanzo’s line.

“Ya know we ain’t on the same team, darlin’.”

“It must be a force of habit, to save you when you run blindly into danger.” Hanzo answered, unseen.

Jesse responded with a breathless laugh, hopelessly smitten. Hanzo took it for exhaustion.

“Getting tired, gunslinger?” An arrow shot out to land on Reinhardt’s chestpiece when he came into view behind him. Jesse switched back to his team’s line and shot a grin in his general direction.

“Not a chance!” he hollered back.

Winston called an end to practice to smooth out final legal matters with their UN rep regarding Widowmaker’s upcoming transfer. In the locker room Jesse tried to catch up to Hanzo, but was thwarted by the fog of the showers and Reinhardt’s enormous form. After that, lunch happened, then Torbjörn dragged him away to give him _another_ last minute lecture on proper care of the Watchpoint’s turret system. Then Angela appeared to give him a refill of the chafing lotion for his arm and stayed to yell at him when she found him smoking on a balcony. Reinhardt called him into his room to figure out how to work the commenting section of some Korean gaming website, Torbjörn thought about something _else_ to tell him about the turrets, then Lena demanded he say hi to Emily in a lengthy holochat.

Suddenly it was dinnertime, followed by him helping Genji with the dishes. Then Mei, Hanzo, and Zenyatta joined them in the rec room to watch one last episode of their current drama before they left.

Then it was 2238, and Hanzo and Genji stood up to go to bed. Hanzo bid them goodnight in Japanese, Jesse answered in Spanish, and then went to bed himself.

He dreamt of fire, gunshots. A hand drenched in red clutching at his trembling hands with a wet, whispered _‘perdoname, mijo’._ A choice, a needle at his back, a gun in his hand. Laughter that was sick, twisted, mirthless. A bovine skull in the sand, a merciless sun. [11]

Too much, too bright.

Too dark, then nothing.

* * *

 

He discovered the next morning that he never replaced the empty bottle of whiskey.

His alarm read 0915, a good few hours before the Siberia team took off. They’d all be down preparing in the hangar, or having a late breakfast in the dining hall. He went through his morning routine trying to remind himself of the people living in the base to chase away the ghosts in his head.

It was taking him longer than usual to shake off the din of his nightmares.

He wasn’t a fool. It was getting worse, had been ever since the mission to Hanamura. Angela would probably want him to go bother her about it, but he knew the pills didn’t work at the dosage she prescribed, and he wasn’t about to actually _talk_ about what was bothering him.

Skeletons from his closet had no business making their way into hers. Angie had her own nightmares. The difference was she meditated with Zenyatta, and he couldn’t sit still.

What he needed was a distraction, he decided as he toweled off and reached for his toothbrush.

When he got to the kitchen, it was empty. Jesse checked his handheld for any orders that may have been issued while he slept as he sipped on coffee and called it a morning. He’d go meet up with everyone in the hangar. He headed back to his room to retrieve his chestplate and weapons.

The hallway was empty and quiet, the sound of his spurs echoed. He stared down at the tips of his boots as he walked and tried to will his mind to ease away from his dreams. 

He needed a distraction, he needed-

“Jesse.”

He looked up. Hanzo, ever silent, stood a few steps from him. He wore his typical _gi_ , and Jesse traced the shape of a lightning bolt with his eyes. “Hey sweetheart. What brings you here? Ain’t y’all busy with mission prep?”

“They can manage my absence for a few minutes. I came to find you.” He took a couple steps closer, peering up at Jesse’s face hidden in the shadow of his hat. “Are you alright?”

“Peachy keen, darlin’.” he answered with a grin. Hanzo must have accepted his answer, because he stepped back and crossed his arms. He didn’t walk away, but he didn’t say anything else either. He just looked at him, almost expectantly. Jesse’s stomach clenched. The ache he had come to associate with Hanzo’s presence hadn’t dissolved with that kiss.

They were alone.

“You’re leavin’ today.” Jesse stated.

“I am.” Hanzo answered. His eyes had always seemed so cold before, long ago. A brown so dark and dull they almost appeared grey. Now they were bright in the artificial light of the hallway. He figured his own weren’t as pretty, but it didn’t keep Hanzo from looking right back at them.

Silence stretched between them. McCree cleared his throat and tried again. “You said you came lookin’ for me?”

“I did.” Short, curt answers. As friendly as the day they met. But Jesse knew better now.

“Well, you uh- You found me.” he said weakly. Hanzo didn’t grace him with an answer. Jesse bit his lip, then bit the bullet. “Look sweetheart, we haven’t talked about what happened back in Japan. What you did. What we did.”

“We haven’t.”

“Why?” Jesse asked, more than a bit put out. “I mean, we ain’t actin’ any different than before!”

Hanzo blinked. “Should we be?” he asked, genuinely perplexed.

“No?” The question threw him off. Had that been it then? He forced his tone to remain lightly neutral despite the cold weight settling in his stomach. “No, this’s fine. If you… want to just be friends then that’s… I’ll respect that.” He brought his hand up to scratch at the back of his neck and drew his gaze away from the archer.

“How gallant of you. However, that is not the case.” His dry tone made Jesse look back at him. The bastard was smiling now, enjoying his discomfort.

“That ain’t the case?” He repeated. Hanzo simply nodded. “Then what is it, Shimada-san, ‘cause you’ve been actin’ pretty indifferent to this whole affair since we got back!”

Hanzo shifted, settling his weight on the opposite hip. “Perhaps I was waiting for you to make the next move.”

“I’ve been trying!” he gestured broadly with his hands, “You keep brushin’ me off or goin’ off to train!”

“You try at inopportune times and are completely transparent with your intentions.”

“Awww, c’mon Hanzo, what do I gotta do?” The feeling in his stomach lightened now that he knew he wasn’t being rejected. He grinned, inspired. “Do I gotta go through Genji? Get his blessin’?”

Hanzo snorted. He uncrossed his arms and leaned a shoulder against the wall. “Don't be ridiculous.”

“Well not to offend, but I seem to recall you needin’ his permission to kiss me-”

“-And if you wish for there to be a repeat occurrence, I suggest you cease your mockery lest I change my mind.”

That brightened him right up. “So you do wanna?”

Hanzo considered him with raised brows, “I am afraid, cowboy, that I do not understand the question. Do I _‘wanna’_ what?”

“I mean, I’ll settle for kissin’ you again. But if we’re puttin’ our cards on the table then, sweetheart, I’d really like you to fuck m-”

Hanzo darted forward and clamped his hand over his mouth. He looked down the hallway to make sure it was clear before hissing, “Must you be so _crass?”_

McCree grumbled until he was released. Hanzo did so hesitantly, still eyeing the hall. “You asked.” he defended himself glumly, aiming a pout at the shorter man. He looked unimpressed.

“I did. Pity I was not convinced by your answer.”

“Hanzoooo.” he whined again, getting into his personal space, crowding him against the wall. Hanzo went, fighting back a little grin. Jesse planted his hands against the wall and dipped down to bury his face in Hanzo’s neck. “Come on sweetheart, what do you want? You want me to beg? I’ll do it!”

He felt Hanzo suck in a breath at that and let his lips spread in a triumphant grin. He moved up to press his lips against the shell of his ear and purr, “I’d ask real nice. Darlin’ for you I’d go down on my knees. Beg _real_ pretty.”

Hanzo shoved at him, and Jesse went, laughing all the way. Hanzo made sure there were more than a couple inches between them before speaking. “I would ask if you had any scruples abasing yourself in such a manner, but I believe I already know the answer.”

“Only scruple I got’s that you still got your clothes on.” Jesse shrugged, going for casual.

“Interesting.” Hanzo said, and his previously playful expression shuttered off.

Jesse blinked down at him. “What is?”

Hanzo cast one last look down the hall before he grabbed him by the top of his sarape to pull him down for a kiss.

He went gladly, happy to let Hanzo lick into his mouth. He gasped when Hanzo bypassed any semblance of chastity, hips pressed hard against him, his grip hard on the fabric of his _sarape,_ his lips hard against his own.

And speaking of hard things.

“It’s interesting,” Hanzo whispered against his lips, yanking him down the empty hall, “Because I thought that problem was mine alone.” His hand abandoned red wool and went to settle on the side of his neck. Jesse moved forward in a haze, magnetized to Hanzo’s presence. There was a buzzing under his skin, at his fingertips, longing to touch him, touch more, touch-

They stopped. Hanzo pulled back and Jesse looked up and registered they were standing in front of his bedroom door.

“Open it.” the archer ordered softly. Jesse’s fingers suddenly lost all finesse as he reached over his shoulder to access the keypad. It took him three tries to punch in his passcode correctly. He didn’t miss the flash of amusement in Hanzo’s eyes as he was finally able to slide the door open. He immediately winced and wished he did a better job of cleaning.

“It smells like an ashtray.” Hanzo sniffed from directly behind him. Jesse stepped to the side to cover the actual ashtray.

“I- I’ll… uh, pop open a window.” he stammered and went to do just that, but then Hanzo’s hand shot out to grab at the edge of his _sarape,_ tugging to pull it off. Jesse turned and watched him slide the door shut and the flip the lock.

“Come here.” he said as he tossed the _sarape_ on the floor. Jesse went.

He gathered him up in a kiss again, this one sweet and slow. Hanzo sighed into it when Jesse wrapped both arms around him, letting Hanzo push until his back met a wall and a glass bottle was kicked away. He toyed with the scarf holding back his hair, loosening the knot while Hanzo continued to kiss him, and kiss him. And kiss him, like he couldn’t do it enough, like he had been waiting almost as long as Jesse had. And damn if that thought didn’t bring a happy flutter to his chest.

Hanzo began to pull again, this time downwards. The bed was about four paces away, but Jesse let his back slide down the wall obediently, knocking his own hat off. Then the scarf fell away, this time catching on Hanzo’s shoulder as he followed him, settling himself between Jesse’s spread eagle legs. He sat with his own tucked beneath him, a stately image. Jesse had to look up slightly to meet his eyes, and Hanzo had to dip down to kiss him again.

Jesse mused over the new angle, settling one hand on his waist while the other brushed over the fan of grey at his temple. He felt fingers undoing the buttons on his shirt, a hand leave his scruffy cheek to push it off his shoulders. That hand slid beneath fabric, against the skin of his arm and down, pulling faded cotton with it until-  

“McCree.”

“Yeah?” he opened his eyes when the warmth of Hanzo’s breath abandoned him. He found the archer glaring down at his arm as if it had offended him, the sleeve of his overshirt turned inside out over his prosthetic. “Oh. Oops. Here, let me, you needa-”

Hanzo shoved his right hand off and took advantage of the raised arm to bend it back slightly and finish diverging him of that particular sleeve. “Just tell me what to do.”

“You gotta turn the knob at the elbow, it releases the catch, but-.”

“Ah,” he muttered as he dug beneath fabric and tried to do as told, “So it has a purpose other than being unseemly, and- no--” McCree bit his lip to keep from laughing at his struggle. “I can’t get a hold of it.”  

“Well see now, I told ya I’d do-” The end of his sentence disappeared into Hanzo’s mouth. Jesse let himself laugh, Hanzo abandoned the sleeve to instead palm at the bulge in his pants and his laughter tapered off into a moan.  

_“Urusai.”_ Hanzo said, hand traveling up to open his belt with a _click,_ then pulling until it slid to the floor. [12]

“Aw hell sweetheart,” The button on his pants opened next, then the zipper, “That ain’t fair at all.” His hands went up to push at the half of the _gi_ covering his chest, “Here, let me-” Hanzo pushed them away.

“I said be quiet.” he delivered his admonishment with teeth to where neck met shoulder.

“Yessir.” Jesse squirmed under him, he brought his legs up so his thighs came to rest against Hanzo’s sides. Hanzo rose to his knees slightly, displacing him. Jesse’s hands grabbed at his muscled arms to steady himself while Hanzo pulled him forward, taking the jeans from his hips as he went until they bunched at his upper thighs, leaving him in his boxers. Jesse’s back hit the wall again, and Hanzo decided to ruck his muscle shirt up to his armpits seeing as he had deemed the arm a lost cause.

Giving a frustrated huff, Jesse pushed back, then reached his right arm in the small space between them to dig beneath cloth and untuck the sleeve. He brought the muscle shirt over his head and threw both offending articles to the other side of the room.  

“There, see? That simple. Now you.” He tried to reach for the _gi_ again, but Hanzo caught his hands and brought one to his waist, and the other to his lips.

“No.” The word ghosted against the skin of his wrist. His lips trailed to his fingertips, and Jesse watched, wide-eyed and thrown. A flash of tongue, his index finger sank into the warmth of his mouth, then reappeared against parted lips. Hanzo’s dark eyes looked up to lock onto his.

Jesse wrenched his hand from his grasp to wrap it around the back of his neck and pull him forward, down, to crash against him. Desperate, like that day by the lake, except now they wrapped around each other safe within the walls of Gibraltar, the quiet of Jesse’s room only interrupted by their own breaths. Jesse ran his metal hand against the warm, hard planes of Hanzo’s abdomen, dipping along muscle against the rise and fall of rushed breaths. Then up, palm pressed to the swell of his chest, over blue ink, then back down. Hanzo inhaled sharply, Jesse felt it against his lips, grinned, then pinched again.

Touching him, with the wrong hand maybe, but touching him. It was enough, the buzzing at his fingertips spread throughout his body from the point where he cupped Hanzo’s jaw with his flesh hand, running his thumb along his carefully kept beard. Hanzo’s fingernails dug into his biceps, then unclenched, and went up to frame his face and he surged up again, forcing Jesse’s head back.

They broke apart, and Jesse opened his eyes to see Hanzo looking down at him, mouth parted and gasping slightly, lovely eyes ringed in a red flush. His heart stuttered, he didn’t notice when Hanzo reached down to pull him free from the confines of his boxers until he felt the first stroke of a calloused hand.

“Oh, shit.” he gasped out, and Hanzo’s lips tugged up at a corner. He gave another stroke, so Jesse tried once more to tug at the _gi,_ figure out how to untie the _obi,_ but Hanzo’s hand abandoned him to swat his hands away again.

“No.” he repeated.

“Sweetheart, c’mon.” Jesse protested weakly, but Hanzo shook his head. He brought his hand up to his mouth and licked. He pushed Jesse back against the wall with fingers running through the hair at his chest. Then he brought his hand back down and swallowed his moan, then his _‘please’,_ then his name _._ His gasps didn’t meet air until Hanzo began to trail a series of kisses down the line of his bared throat. He sucked in a frantic lungful when he could past the short cries rising from his throat. The hand wrapped around his dick pumped him slowly at first, tight and steady, long and drawn out and maddening.

“Sweetheart, please, I-” a high whine replaced words, result of the thumb pressing just beneath the head of his cock and the mark blooming against his collarbone. He was clutching onto his arms hard enough to bruise. Sunlight streamed through the drawn blinds, bathing Hanzo’s hair in a soft hazy glow. Like a halo.   

He twisted his wrist, and Jesse jerked, the movement settling him further onto Hanzo’s lap. Hanzo went with it and braced his tattooed forearm against the wall. He rested the lower side of his face against the crown of Jesse’s head and increased his pace. Jesse’s brown hair stuck to a corded neck that had begun to gather perspiration in the heat of the room. His forehead pressed against the silk of Hanzo’s _gi,_ and his eyes were met with the sight of a his hand trailing down to lightly fondle at his balls.

He cursed and buried his face against Hanzo’s chest, willing the heat pooling at his center to subside. But it gathered instead, urged on by Hanzo’s scent, close enough to take in for the first time. He looked down again, at his flushed cock within the archer’s grip, close, so close, a kaleidoscope of colors at the edge of his vision if he _just-_

“Please.” he begged, closing his eyes again to pant against tattooed skin. Close, fuck but he was close. He almost didn’t register the sound of his own voice, gravelly and wrecked as it was, whispering in a prayer, _“Dios,_ Hanzo, please, _ah fuck-”_ [13]  

“You were right.” Hanzo muttered, his breath warm against his hair. Jesse almost didn’t catch it, the heat in his gut wrung tight, tighter, almost to the brim, edged on by his hand, the tunnel his hips stuttered up to fuck into.

Jesse managed a weak, rasping, “‘Bout what?”

“It’s pretty.” Hanzo said with his lips pressed to the side of his head. Jesse bucked, he gasped, bit into his shoulder to muffle his groan as he came and his vision whited out. Hanzo held him through it, and Jesse’s nails dug grooves in his back, just trying to hold on. Hanzo’s hand kept working, he held them together, no doubt smearing his _gi_ with ejaculate. He didn’t seem to mind.

Jesse weakly thumped at his back, unable to form words, trying to get him to lay off. Hanzo got the message. Jesse’s arms fell back from around him, and his back met the cold wall, loose-limbed and spent.  

Panting, chest heaving, his mind a complete blank. Side effect of bliss.

Hanzo planted a final kiss to the corner of his mouth. A small square hand towel appeared from the pouch on his belt. Jesse winced, oversensitive as he wiped him down, then ran the towel along his own fingers. Quick, clever fingers tucked him back in, followed by the elastic snap of his boxer’s waistband. Then he rose to his knees, then his feet. Jesse reached up to grasp at the hem of his _gi_.

“Hold on there, doll. Don’t I get to have a go atcha?”

“I have been away from the hangar for too long. I must help with the preparations.”  

“That’s a god awful excuse. C’mere.” he made to stand up, but Hanzo stopped him with the heel of his foot. He didn’t say anything, only stepped back and pulled up the left side of his _gi,_ then put his arm through the sleeve. He considered the drying stain on his shirt with a little frown, but simply put left over right and hid it from sight. He readjusted his _obi,_ then turned this way and that over the mess of his floor until he spotted his scarf peeking out from beneath the edge of the bed. He bent over to pick it up and ran his fingers through his hair, evening out the messy spots where Jesse’s hands had buried themselves. He went about gathering the spill of it high on top of his head, then wrapped the scarf around it, tying it once. Then he carefully parted and pulled a single lock of his hair so that it fell over the side of his face.

Jesse smiled watching him secure his ponytail with one last knot. He wouldn’t have guessed that the forelock was something Hanzo did meticulously. There he stood, put together, prim and proper, as if nothing had just happened. Not a hair out of place. No evidence other than the scent that no doubt clung to him, sex mingled in with stale smoke.

He glanced over to where his hat lay, then scooted over to pick it up. He shimmied back into his pants, then stood to put on his belt.

“Will you be there to see the team off?” Hanzo asked all of a sudden.

Jesse paused with his fingers doing up the buttons of his retrieved shirt. “Wouldn’t-” his voice came out weaker than he expected, so he coughed, “Wouldn’t miss it, darlin’.”

Hanzo nodded. Jesse stared at him, watching the way his eyes caught the light. A thought wormed its way into his mind. Hanzo turned to the door.    

“Wait,” he called out, “Before you leave. Can I ask ya somethin’? Promise you won’t lie?”

Hanzo paused with his hand on the lock, “What reason would I have to lie? Ask your question.”

“Back there, you said you came to find me. You’ve had plenty an opportunity to come find me before, sweetheart. Why now?” He didn’t give Hanzo a chance to answer before shooting him another question, “Genji told you to come find me before y’all left, didn’t he?”

Hanzo’s mouth opened and closed without making a sound, the expression that crossed his face spoke volumes. Color rushed to his cheeks. Jesse’s howling laughter followed him out the door.

* * *

 

Winston’s night watch rotations were a thing of the past. Widowmaker was scheduled to be picked up by UN forces that afternoon. Jesse’s gaze traced the shape of white cliffs against a grey sky, the sigh of the waves his only companion as he meandered along the edge of the Watchpoint checking on the turrets. The team in Russia had finished their training with Volskaya’s Svyatogor mechs yesterday. Today they would launch a joint attack against the Siberian Omnium in an effort to shut it down and halt rogue omnic production.

Angie, Hanzo, Genji, Mei, Lena, Torbjörn. All about to face off against the stuff of nightmares. It was the job, Jesse knew better than to pile his worries onto them. But the knowledge that this is what they trained for didn’t settle his nerves.

He twitched when his phone vibrated in his pocket. He winced at the bright light of the projected screen, scrolling down through Overwatch notifications and to-do lists to get to his messages. He smiled when he saw the name that flashed up to greet him.

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Archer:**

I never asked you in return. What color do you like?

**(12:50)**

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Payaso de Rodeo:**

howdy :)  

**(12:52)**

red

**(12:52)**

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Archer:**

I suppose I should have known a desert-dweller

such as yourself would favor the color of the sun.

**(12:53)**

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Payaso de Rodeo:**

???? the sun aint red its yellow

**(12:53)**

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Archer:**

...If you think the sun is yellow, then what

color is the moon?

**(12:54)**

 

Jesse waved to Fareeha as she jogged past. She doubled back and peered over his shoulder as he typed. She barked out a laugh.

“Is this what old men talk about?” she teased. Jesse grumbled and pushed her off when she tried to make a grab for his phone. She licked a finger, stuck it in his ear, then ran away before he could retaliate. He shouted obscenities as she disappeared.

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Payaso de Rodeo:**

silver

**(12:57)**

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Archer:**

The moon is yellow.

**(12:58)**

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Payaso de Rodeo:**

???no, its silver. aint yall supposed to be

busy right now?    

**(13:00)**

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Archer:**

Genji agrees with me and says you’re

insane. Yes, we’re about to ship out.  I

thought

**(13:03)**

I thought it would be… prudent to let

you know.

**(13:04)**

 

He bumped into the next turret and nearly dropped the phone when he began grinning dopily and failed to check where he was going. He rubbed at his forehead and answered with one hand.

 

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Payaso de Rodeo:**

im callin cultural differences.

**(13:05)**

thats mighty kind of u to think of me.

thanks sweetheart. you do good out there   

**(13:06)**

 

He waited a few minutes for a response, but received none. He shrugged and took it to mean they were on their way to the site. Slowly, he made his rounds, checking to make sure the turrets were loaded and working, then did inventory in the warehouse.

Winston was holed up in his lab, keeping tabs on the Siberia team and the UN extraction team. Vaswani was probably with him, keeping tabs for Vishkar. Athena kept Amélie monitored, Faree was probably still doing laps. Reinhardt greeted him with a sandwich when he wandered into the kitchen for a late lunch. Lúcio’s music echoed through the halls. He wandered outside to smoke and found Zenyatta talking to the seagulls by the launchpad.

“Hello McCree.”

“Hey Zen. Feedin’ the birds?” he said through a mouthful of BLT.

He nodded, gesturing to the little bag of crumbs settled in the dip of his crossed legs. The gulls grew restless when he approached, and the more skittish ones flew away. Zenyatta turned to look straight at McCree. “Did you know there are monkeys in the forest surrounding us? They’ve begun to approach me as I meditate, but I am not sure of the repercussions of feeding them.”  

“Better not. They’ll get used to the easy life and forget how to forage.” he tore up the crust of his bread and tossed it at the birds. From above, he heard the hum of approaching aircraft. He frowned and squinted past the meager light the sun gave through the curtain of clouds in the sky. All he could make out was a speck.

“Hey Athena? Is that the UN team?” he called out. Zenyatta abandoned his birds to float towards him and look up at the sky.

Her voice came from a speaker to their left. “I’m sorry Agent McCree, could you repeat your query? I do not know to what you are referring.”

“There’s a group of helicopters headed right for us. I don’t got a clear visual just yet, but I can kinda see ‘em.”

“My scanners aren’t picking up on any aircraft. The tower hasn’t been contacted. I will check again. Should I alert Winston?”   

They were close enough he could begin to make them out. Black and nondescript. No clear affiliation, no wreath of olive branches. Jesse took a few steps back, Peacekeeper left its holster, and Jesse held it ready to his side.

“Athena…” he began. His mind flashed back to a train heist, goons in tactical suits and gaudy helmets, using the Blackwatch playbook. His playbook. “Lock us down. Alert Winston. It’s Talon. They’ll be comin’ for their asset. Get someone in the basement, _now!”_

“I’m dispatching Symmetra. Agents McCree and Zenyatta, get inside the base!” Winston said from their earpieces. Zenyatta began to make his way, but Jesse kept his eyes on the nearest helicopter, close enough now that he saw the gun mounted on a stand within the open door at its side. It took aim.

“Zenyatta, move!” He shouted, running over to him and the warehouse. Zenyatta just cleared its shelter when bullets started raining down. They hid behind a stack of metal crates and watched one of the turrets come to life, swinging to aim up at their attackers. The rattling sound of its fire was nearly overpowered by the roar of the helicopters’ blades. Jesse chanced a glance at them, saw one lower, and something drop.

“Shit.” he swung his arm up to shoot too late, his bullet hitting the wall of a maintenance shed. He saw whatever fell begin to glow blue, then open and project a doorway. “They dropped a teleporter!” he yelled into the comm, lining up his shots for the first few to walk through. Three headshots, and the helicopters above rose and flew off, one lagging behind and spewing a few more operatives that rappelled down on ropes. Jesse aimed and shot at one, and the man fell with a scream and landed with a crunch. From the teleporter came a new group bearing their own shields. Jesse’s bullets ricocheted off and one of Zenyatta’s orbs only slowed them down momentarily. They marched forward and drew mean looking blasters.

“There’s a teleporter up on the eastern roof too, Winston!” Lúcio came online sounding panicked. “I knocked the first few back, but I can’t hold the point alone!”

Behind him, he heard the thunder of footsteps. From the depths of the warehouse came Reinhardt in his suit of armor, barrier drawn.

“DON’T WORRY MY FRIENDS, I WILL BE YOUR SHIELD!” Right behind him flew Pharah, rocket launcher in hand. She scowled beneath her visor, all business. As soon as she cleared the warehouse, she soared up, avoiding fire from the choppers to fly in Lúcio’s direction.

Jesse popped up once Reinhardt got close enough, using his barrier to hide behind as he tried to get the few that weren’t shielded. He ducked to avoid the backswing of his hammer, and pulled out his tablet from his back pocket to check the status of all the turrets. One shot down at the roof, another at the tower. The one down by the teleporter was operating, but still aiming at the two helicopters that circled above returning fire. The one he had just checked that morning was reporting as jammed. He cursed, ran around into the first floor of the tower to get to it, he took a set of stairs two at a time.

A volley of Zenyatta’s orbs blasted into the side of a helicopter that strayed too close to the catwalk and Zenyatta, who had just emerged from the Watchpoint’s elevator. It careened off, crashing into the cliff face, then screeching against limestone as it slid into the sea below.

While Jesse dodged a beam from one of the masked Talon agents, he saw the teleporter shimmer in prep for another round. But this time all that poured from it was thick, dark smoke. It pooled on the stone floor of the Watchpoint, twisted and dipped in cracks, sliding down towards the wide entryway to the base.

Then the smoke condensed, rising up in a swirl to form the shape of a man. From his high vantage point, Jesse took aim and shot it through the head.

He may as well have been shooting at air. The specter fell back to its gaseous state and reformed within the warehouse. The Reaper brought him back to that night in Hanamura. Dressed head to toe in black, two heavy pistols in his hands. It cast a look at the mayhem around him, face hidden by a mask fashioned to look like a skull.

“WINSTON!” Reinhardt yelled, “Reaper is here!”

Jesse thumped the barrel of his turret after calibrating it. It hummed to life beneath his fingers. “I got him!” he called out. Winston implored him to be careful, and Jesse assured him he would. He took another path into the Watchpoint, guided by Athena to the Reaper’s location.

A memory rose to the forefront of his mind. Jesse shot at a masked agent that tried to get behind him as he chased after the ghost creeping uninvited into their home.

It wasn’t a skull. His mask was a barn owl. _Una lechuza._ The harbinger of death in the tales his mother told him on cold desert nights. Except this one wasn’t dressed in white.

Reaper took up his form again somewhere between the locker rooms, bypassing the labs completely. Winston was standing guard to protect Athena’s servers, but it seemed they weren’t interested in the agent database this time.

A triumphant laugh rang through the comm. Zenyatta and Reinhardt had destroyed their teleporter.

“Yeah!” Lúcio cheered, followed by a yelp and a meek, “Now can you get over here and-” Whatever he said next was cut off by a high pitched beep, then the line went silent. Jesse came to a stop outside one of the range doors, and tried to reconnect.

Finger pressed to his ear, he whispered, “This’s McCree, anybody read me?” He heard the sound of distant gunfire. He was close enough to the eastern side of the base to hear their fight. The ground shook with the force of Pharah’s barrage. “Winston? Athena?”  

“Jesse James!” came a voice from his pocket. He pulled out his handheld and stared at the sugar skull where Athena’s ‘A’ should have been. _“Que hubo?”_ [14]

He grunted, _“Sabes, no es justo que me des un apodo cuando yo ni sé tu nombre, calaverita.”_ [15]

The voice chuckled, _“Ya te dije, nomas soy una sombra.”_ Jesse spotted a trail of black smoke disappearing down a flight of stairs and hoped Satya would be enough to hold the fucker off. _“Sabes, fue demasiado fácil accesar sus líneas personales. Alguien debe de encargarse de eso.”_ [16]

Jesse snorted, transferred the call connection to his earpiece, and pocketed the phone. He reloaded when from his left a door banged open and Lúcio skated through, leading a line of Talon agents into the hall from a wide balcony. He shot them down, and Lúcio winced in sympathy as they fell. “Tell me, Sombrita. Are you here too? You waitin’ for me to put a bullet in your skull?” he lined another shot.

“Tinnitus! Watch the tinnitus, man!” Lúcio called out.

_“You’re_ telling _me_ to watch the tinnitus? Really Lulu!?”

Sombra laughed, deep and mocking. “Oh, I hear you’re very good, but I doubt even you can aim as far as Russia.”

That jarred him, but he kept shooting, not letting it affect his arm. Lúcio skated up, hid behind him, and started messing with his amplifier. His music soothed Jesse, and he took a deep breath. “Who you talkin’ to, Woody?”

Jesse shrugged, and Lúcio crowed in victory when a few more agents dropped from the roof and he immediately blasted them off with a soundwave.  

Sombra went on, “And besides, even if you tried you might hit one of your own. The angel, for one. _O tal vez uno de los hermanitos. El verde ese, o...”_ she whistled low just as Jesse fanned the hammer and took down an omnic that dropped onto the balcony, _“...el papi chulo.”_ [17]

“You-” he warned, and Lúcio slammed the door shut, then kicked the lock.

“Relax! If your teammates die, it won’t be me that killed them. I’m more of a behind the scenes kind of girl.”

“What’re you doin’ in Russia, then?” Jesse growled.

“Shit,” Lúcio skated forward, speaking to someone on the line urgently. He muted his sound system and looked back to Jesse, nodding at the stairs, “Come on, man! You waitin’ for an invitation? Vaswani needs backup!”

“What? Can’t a girl check in on her friends?” Sombra said in his ear. From below came the high whine of Satya’s projector, and a raspy, cruel laugh. Lúcio swung out an arm to stop him at the base of the stairs. They watched Satya fall to the floor after the Reaper hurled one of his pistols at her visor, cracking the glass and knocking her out.

He reached into his long coat and pulled out another one and aimed it at her head.

Talk about action flick trope.    

“Look Sombrita, it’s been fun, but I’ma hafta hang up on you.” he whispered just as the Reaper growled out, “Sombra, the door.”

Lúcio looked between the two of them, eyes wide and questioning. Jesse repeated his hapless shrug.

“Fair enough. Me too. _Pero escucha, hazme un favor?”_ [18]

“What?” he asked, dry as desert sand. The Reaper ran some sort of device over the lock, and a projection of purple light cascaded out. The lock shone green and opened with a soft _click._  

_“Acuérdate que no estás solo.”_ With a _boop_ , she was gone. Lúcio eyed the scene before them in worry. [19]

“If we go out there right now he’ll shoot her. What do we do, Mac?”  

“Watch.” he gritted out. He wasn’t risking Vaswani’s life, they weren’t going in guns blazing. Bullets didn’t affect the Reaper in his wraith form. Would they work now when he almost looked human?

Amélie stepped out from behind the previously locked door. Back on the line, Athena was urging them to report, as she had lost visual in the basement level, no doubt due to the hacker.

“You certainly took your sweet time.” Amélie said coolly with a disinterested glance to the architech crumbled on the floor.

“I’ve been busy.”

“The cowboy is here, Reaper. What, did you not like your present?”

“He got fat.” From within his coat, the Reaper pulled out a fully assembled sniper rifle and handed it over.

Widowmaker’s expression didn’t change, but she still managed to give off a vibe of being unimpressed. “What happened?” she asked.

“The old men tried for a power play, then fell for the oldest trick in the book. The golden son _soliloquized_. By the time I got word the idiots were already behind bars.”

“Unfortunate.” she sighed. She shouldered the rifle and looked to him expectantly. “Will this be all?”

“Yes.” Jesse and Lúcio ducked back when they turned to look to the staircase. “No, not that way. There’s a maintenance elevator at the other end of the hall. I’ll catch up.”

“What will you do?” said the Widowmaker, voice followed by the sound of her heels tapping against tile.

“Make sure the eavesdroppers don’t get any ideas about following you.”

Lúcio’s hand shot out to grab at Jesse’s forearm. They exchanged glances, then the Reaper spoke again. “I know your kind, ingrate. Stupid. Just like on that train, you’ll let us go if it means I don’t spill this one’s brains. Why don’t you come out and chat, McCree?”

“So you can shoot my brains out instead? Naw, I’ll pass.” he responded with his back pressed against the wall. His trigger finger twitched against the guard.

It laughed, the sound sending shivers down both their spines. Lúcio looked like he was going to be sick, the scent of rot wafted through the hallway. _“Hasta luego, cabrón.”_ [20]  

Jesse and Lúcio jumped out at the same time, aiming their weapons down the hallway, empty save for Satya groaning on the floor as she came to. Lúcio went to her, speakers emitting soft healing music. She took Jesse’s hand when he offered it to help her up while Lúcio reported their position to Athena.

Together, all three rushed up the stairs again and ran towards the roof exit, where they could still hear the sound of fighting from outside. Symmetra blasted two with beams, then eyed the transporter’s shield critically.

“Agent Lúcio!” she ordered, and the audiomedic nodded at her, a devious look on his face. He locked his stance and raised his amplifier, and she primed an energy ball.

They blasted past the transporter’s defenses, the portal crackling as it strained. Pharah launched a rocket at it from above. The remaining agents panicked, making them easy pickings for him and Fareeha. Zenyatta and Winston assured them that Athena remained safe. She in turn let them know that the UN’s team were getting ready to intercept their infiltrator’s aircraft.

Jesse watched a pair of helicopters disappear into the cloudy sky, knowing full well the UN wasn’t going to catch up. Talon recovered Widowmaker and shook up every Overwatch agent with the ease of their attack.

As they went back down to the launchpad to help Reinhardt sift through rubble, news came from the team in Siberia. Tracer’s voice was high and pained, reporting as Angela treated a wound to her legs. Winston put her on speaker as he helped lift a sheet of metal to confiscate the husk of the destroyed transporter.

“Something happened to Genji- argh! Angie, ease up on the- no, no it’s okay I’m fine.” she assured the medic on her end. “Winston! Genji he-- he malfunctioned, then took a hit that Zarya could’ve blocked but she didn’t. Hanzo’s in a right state. Mercy says Genji’ll be fine but he’s on sleep mode for now. Your new recruit’s a piece of work, mate. She didn’t even ap- OW, ANGIE!”  

Jesse paid attention just long enough to confirm that everyone was alive. He wanted to pull out his handheld, send out messages, check for himself that everyone was safe.

They weren’t safe, they hadn’t ever been safe. Talon’s message was loud and clear.  

* * *

 

The first thing Reinhardt did when the team from Siberia landed was ease the tension in the air by challenging their newest recruit to an arm wrestling match.

“I accept your challenge!” said Aleksandra Zaryanova. She grinned, but the expression quickly slid off her face when Hanzo shouldered past her, Genji carried between his and Angela’s shoulders. The ninja’s green lights were soft and muted, in a state of forced sleep. They led him into the base. Lena powered off the transport, and the rest made their way into the base. Jesse trailed after Torbjörn to fill him in on the state of his turrets. The engineer grumbled, but thanked him for his efforts in repairing them. Jesse tipped his hat then glanced at Mei and Zarya walking ahead of them, their voices rising in volume until Mei stopped and stomped her foot.

“You’re a bully! You actually approve of your government’s efforts to run a registry? It’s not enough to try and deny their rights?”  

“Omnics are not people.”

“They lost their right to rights when we let them loose and they started killing us. They’re too big a threat to be left unattended, Mei-Ling.” Torbjörn said in Zarya’s defense. Mei shot him a disbelieving look. McCree pushed him aside and suggested he go take a look at those turrets now. Then he turned to the girls.

“This have anything to do with why Genji-kun’s powered off?” he asked, taking in her arms, the tattoo, and the hair. Mei nodded vigorously.

“He fell unconscious, she didn’t report it and just left him!” Mei shoved a finger in her stomach, “You could have helped when the rockets were launched! You projected your barrier onto me before, why not him!?”   

“I-” Zarya seemed remorseful for a second. “I did not know of his condition. But he is more machine than man, or no?”

“No!” Mei exclaimed.

“He seemed a lost cause! He seemed infected!” she defended, shifting back her massive shoulders. Mei sputtered, so Jesse filled in for her.

“You- you can’t just go around assumin’ who’s infected! Y’can’t just go lettin’ people die to give yourself some false sense of security!”

“It is not false sense! It keeps Russia safe if omnics die, yes?”

Mei picked up right where he left off, “No! They were not a threat in the first place, you do nothing to keep Russia safe!”

“I prevent them from killing us. It’s a good thing.”

Mei gave a little shriek of outrage. Jesse spotted Zenyatta coming around the bend, solemn and slow. He eyed Mei, furious, spittle flying as she leaned up to yell at the bodybuilder that almost looked cowed facing down the little climatologist.

“I sensed an alarming amount of discord, my friend. What is the problem?” He asked quietly. McCree nodded at Mei, who was still screaming.

“The direct result of fear mongering.”

Zenyatta made a small noise of understanding. Jesse backed off to let him handle it. He turned on his heel and headed back down the hallway towards the medbay. He spotted Hanzo slumped on the floor against the wall opposite to the medbay doors, the hood of his suit nowhere in sight and his hair a right mess. A bench was to his left. McCree made his way over and slid down to sit at his right.

He let out a long exhale. Breathed in again. It took him a few minutes of calming himself to realize Hanzo had begun to match his breaths. Without prompting, the archer spoke up.  

“I almost got him killed.”

Jesse sighed. “Not by anyone’s reckonin’, you didn’t. What makes you say that?”

Make up the color of rust was smeared on his cheeks. He dug the heels of his hands against his eyes and drew them back with stains that looked like blood. “If he did not bear a resemblance to an omnic-”

“Naw, archer, you zip it right there. The only one who’s at fault is Zaryanova and her damn bigotry. And the omnics that got him.” He wrapped an arm around his broad shoulders, fingers running through frayed fur. “That’s enough of that. He’s fine. By the sound of it, Angie’s only got him on standby to figure out what went wrong.”

Hanzo’s breathing went ragged, and Jesse dipped down to get a look at his face. He froze at the sight that met his eyes.  

“I could have lost him again. I was too far, I did not know what was happening until Mei called for me. I forget-” Hanzo breathed, voice strained in a way Jesse had never heard before. His heart ached. His hand tightened on his shoulder. “I forget, sometimes. That he is real, and that I cannot protect him. That I did not protect him, when it mattered most.”

Jesse didn’t know what to say to that. He measured his own breathing and hoped that would help pull Hanzo back.

“He wasn’t real for so long,” Hanzo choked out, on the verge of tears, “And now that he is I forget he is just as human as I.” Jesse ran his fingers through strands of greying hair and kept quiet. “I lost him, I killed him, and I lost myself. The gods saw fit to return him, he saw fit to forgive me, and I forgot what it felt like to be lost. I-I forgot… _kyōfu kokoro ga wakukata o wasurechatta…”_ [21]

Jesse shushed him, rubbed at his arm murmuring nonsense as Hanzo curled in on himself, body wracked with dry sobs he kept from meeting the cycled air of the medbay hall. Jesse pressed a kiss to his temple, and Hanzo let his head fall onto his shoulder.

Slowly, he calmed.

“Stay?” Hanzo asked hoarsely after an eternity of silence.

“Wouldn’t dream of leavin’, sweetheart.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me tell u the biggest culture shock was having a gaggle of seven year olds tell me I was coloring the sun in wrong. Now here are various words that’ll only make sense to certain people. 
> 
> @aslan: The fourteen year old drawing sasuke is full on crying now i hope you’re satisfied and if you say ‘spicy’ again im gonna  
> @[claro](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClaroQueQuiza/pseuds/ClaroQueQuiza): ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) thx for the help on the elbow  
> @abs: awoo~
> 
>  
> 
> Translations:  
> [0]Hey, ingrate!  
> [1]I’m talking to you! Don’t tell me you turned out to be a coward, fucker.  
> [2]What the hell did you eat in that desert? Dirt?  
> [3]You only eat dirt if you lose, boss. I never lost.  
> [4]What’s wrong, son? What happened?  
> [5]What a shame. I guess you’re going to have to suck it up, son.  
> [6]man  
> [7]Look, Jessito  
> [8]You’re so fucking brave, aren’t you? What do you get out of raising a fuss?  
> [9]Damn it.  
> [10]Come on, Jessito. You can do it. You’re here. You’re here, you’re okay.  
> [11]Forgive me, son.  
> [12]Be quiet.  
> [13]God,  
> [14]What’s up?  
> [15]Y’know it ain’t fair of you to be givin’ me nicknames when I don’t even know your name, little skull.  
> [16]I already told you, I’m just a shadow. You know, it was really easy to access your personal line. Someone should really look into that.  
> [17]Or maybe one of the brothers. The green one, or that…(look, papi chulo can mean one of two things, take your pick: hot stuff/pimp daddy)  
> [18]But listen, do me a favor?  
> [19]Remember that you’re not alone.  
> [20]See you later, dumbass.  
> [21]I forgot how to feel fear.
> 
>  
> 
> Hit me up on tumblr if you wanna, I'm [cantodelcolibri](https://cantodelcolibri.tumblr.com). And, as always, all your wonderful kudos and comments are appreciated, treasured, and coveted by my tearful eyes. So thanks!


	14. Cultural Differences

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m tired. You’re probably tired, but I’m feelin emotional so I’d like to say thank you to all y’all that’ve taken the time to read this, stuck with this story for so long because my gosh is it long. I’m especially thankful to you for putting up with the language shenanigans y’all’re some troopers.
> 
> That said, see end notes for translations, or hover for kanji, because this budding trilingual has no chill

It came as a surprise to no one that when Overwatch’s probation period came to a close, New York launched a final evaluation to try and find fault in Winston’s leadership. It was a thinly veiled attempt to find an excuse to implement one of their own as commander. One by one, the agents were called into the briefing room to have an interview with their overseers, wherein they were questioned extensively. The process was long, the questions rife with purposefully muddled phrasing and double negatives, but everyone had no choice other than to grin and bear it.

They pulled through. Winston gained the official title of Commander, and Overwatch’s allotted funds were released to them to do with as they saw fit. They were cautiously independent, free of the United Nation’s overbearing shadow- for the most part. They could recruit within the budget, but without requiring approval. Missions were more or less the same deal- they couldn’t go play heroes without permission. But they did have the advantage of not having to vet the UN if any countries or powers reached out to them personally in invitation to act within their borders. 

Winston called them together for a briefing, outlining changes and taking requests and suggestions towards improving productivity. Lúcio took on the mantle of dealing with their official social media accounts, Lena suggested they open communications with local military, Mei and Angela proposed they look into relaunching their science programs. Satya relayed Vishkar Corp’s offer at a partnership, Zarya assured them Volskaya Industries would give their support in future ventures, and Fareeha reminded everyone that Helix would always appreciate help down in Egypt. 

It dragged on for hours. Hanzo spent the entirety of it directing a glare at Zaryanova from across the room, comforted by the fact that Mei was doing the exact same thing from three seats down. Despite their newfound freedom, tensions were high, especially considering they still had repairs pending following the attack the week prior. Everyone was stressed and on edge and directing hostility at their newest recruit was doing nothing to aid matters, but he and Mei cared little. The overcrowding in the briefing room drew stark attention to their behavior, and more than one was fidgeting in discomfort. Thirteen around the table made for a tight fit. Everyone was relieved when Winston called the meeting to a close and they were allowed to leave.

It would have been fourteen, but Dr. Ziegler had yet to release Genji from the medbay. 

“I don’t know how this happened, he’s not an omnic.” Angela explained to a concerned Hanzo and McCree just outside the medbay doors the day they landed and she admitted him to the patient wing, “He isn’t a machine. There should be no way for him to become corrupted by a god program, at least not in the way it would infect an omnic- his mind is his own. It would have to be a manual effort to compromise his body, and Zarya didn’t report seeing anything other than him malfunctioning in the field. I will have Torbjörn look into this as soon as he is able, and we’ll rouse him once we know no one’s in danger.” 

Jesse had taken his desperate plea to heart that night. He stayed. He followed Hanzo out of the medbay when Angela turned down the lights and gently urged them to get some rest. His hand pressed against his back, guiding him through the halls until they reached Hanzo’s bedroom. Hanzo’s shaky grip on his sarape had been enough to convince Jesse to close the door behind them and follow him to bed. 

They slept.

When Hanzo awoke with the dawn hours later, he froze upon realizing he wasn’t alone. The memories rushed at him as he pried his eyes open and found his head resting upon a freckled shoulder. From his vantage point, he saw the rise and fall of McCree’s chest, covered by a ratty white t shirt. His mechanical arm lay across his stomach, Hanzo raised his own to trace lightly over the knuckles. Then he carefully propped himself up on his elbow to look down at him. 

His mind was curiously blank as he took in the man beneath him. He spotted crow’s feet at the corners of Jesse’s closed eyes. His mouth was downturned in an uncharacteristic frown, his hair a tangled mess with the right side of his beard smushed, no doubt from being pressed against Hanzo’s head. He looked tired and a little bit sad, and Hanzo wondered what he was dreaming of to bring about such an expression. He thought it would be kind to wake him, but he couldn’t bring himself to speak.

He had spent too long not trusting anyone in his bed long enough to stay the night to have a firm grasp on what behavior was appropriate. The mere thought that McCree -who knew of his past and knew him to the extent that he did- would trust him at his most vulnerable was humbling.  

Hanzo had forgotten what it was like to share space with another person. He had never known what it took to let someone in, to form a connection with another human and simply coexist. The answer, it seemed, was simply to ask. 

Jesse awakened slowly, face screwing up in displeasure at the bright sunlight peeking through the blinds. His eyes opened, and he stiffened for a second. He turned his head to the left, made note of the unfamiliar room, then turned to the right and met Hanzo’s gaze.  

They stared at one another, both at a certain degree of loss for what to do. 

Hanzo broke the tender silence first.  _ “Ohayō.” _ he whispered. 

Jesse looked just as stumped as Hanzo felt, as if the moment would reveal itself to be some improbable dream if he so much as moved. He blinked, and then his lips spread in a radiant smile. He reached his metal hand up to tuck Hanzo’s hair behind his ear.

_ “Buenas, cariño.” _ [1]

* * *

 

Reinhardt approached Winston urgently during a training session one chilly afternoon. Hanzo paused his critique of Satya’s form to watch him charge a path down to the sparring mats. Soon enough they drew a crowd. First Lena, then Lúcio and Zenyatta. Zaryanova abandoned her barbells to edge within earshot, and Hanzo shot her a menacing look when it brought her within a meter of proximity to himself and the architech. Mei jogged up to them, and Zarya's answering glower turned to something chastened and she turned away to watch Reinhardt shout excitedly. 

“WINSTON! WE MUST PREPARE THE TRANSPORT! Where is little Lena? Or perhaps young Fareeha? I may be able to squeeze into the cockpit if there is no other choice, but I must be quick!” 

“Quick?” Winston repeated, frozen with a water bottle still held up to his mouth. Next to him, Lena shrugged.

“YES! I must get going! Who knows how much time there is left, if those hooligans had help-!”  

“Aye, quit your blubbering you mountainous baby. Hand me over.” said Torbjörn’s voice from Reinhardt’s hand. The sound of construction work muffled him, he was outside with Jesse and Fareeha working on repairs. The knight passed his handheld to the gorilla, who had to juggle a bit to keep it within his grasp when the other man’s hands were shaking too hard to properly hand it over. 

Torbjörn went on in the midst of the pass-off. “The bucket head’s in a bit of an emotional state. Let me translate: German authorities arrested a couple of snot-nosed kids that had pieces of some very recognizable armor in their possession. Confessed and said they came out of Eichenwalde.” 

“Looters!” Reinhardt’s voice went from shaking with tears to quavering in excitement. “Who knows what else those criminals failed to uncover! This could lead to clues that others survived! Or at the very least, we would be able to finally put them to rest!” 

Finally understanding, Winston put on a soothing voice, “I understand the necessity, Reinhardt. But wouldn’t this best be left to the authorities?” 

“ _ Nein, _ Winston. The forest around Eichenwalde is a landmine. Too many omnic corpses, no way of knowing if they’re prone to waking up.” Reinhardt explained. Behind him, Zarya’s face clouded over. 

“Those lily-livered pigs won’t go near it, but you bet your armored arse that scavengers won’t think twice if it means they get their hands on spoils of the war.” Torbjörn joined in again on the comm.  

“Eichenwalde was where the Crusaders made their last stand, wasn’t it, Reinhardt?” Lena asked. 

He nodded. “I was one of the few to make it out.” He turned back to their commander. “I know we shouldn’t be quick to spend our resources, but this would mean more than the world to me, my friend.” 

“It would gain us considerable public approval, to be seen as empathetic enough to go out of our way to put old heroes to rest.” Satya put in clinically. Lúcio opened his mouth, then closed it, and nodded. 

“Hate to say it, and I wouldn’t have said it like she said it, but she’s right.” he leaned against Winston’s side and began looking up information on the Crusaders on his handheld. 

Surrounded, Winston sighed and nodded. “Alright. You’ve got my approval. Use the rest of today to gather what you need, or you can leave as soon as your proposal’s in my inbox so I can forward it to Geneva in good faith. Give the details to Athena so she can begin clearing your flight path. Who are you going to take?” 

“Take?” Reinhardt repeated. Winston nodded, but slowly, as if doubting his own words. 

“Yes? Five more, at least. It’s, uh...” he took off his glasses to polish them hastily, “It’s your mission, Agent.”

“Oh.” Reinhardt stood up straight and looked at the agents around them. Lúcio and Lena had already raised their hands to volunteer. “Will you come with me, commander?” 

“Will I- what?” Winston sputtered. Reinhardt grinned. 

“I can think of no one better to accompany me!” 

“Count me out. Too much to do.” grunted Torbjörn from the comm still in Winston’s hand. He handed it back, then used the same hand to scratch at the back of his neck. 

“Uh, sure.” he grunted. Reinhardt boomed a laugh, and then began calling names. 

“Lena, of course! LÚCIO! To fight at your side is always a privilege, young man! Zenyatta, are you sure? Then you are welcome, my friend! And let’s see… Ms. Vaswani! Would you do me the honor?” 

Satya startled next to Hanzo. He watched, amused, as she processed the request with wide eyes. “I- I don’t know if my schedule would allow me to-” 

“It should be no more than a couple of days, at most!” Reinhardt beseeched, blue and scarred eyes going wide and begging. Satya cast a look at Hanzo, then at Mei. Both encouraged her with a nod.  

She agreed and moved forward to follow the selected group out of the range. Mei made a pleased noise at the back of her throat. “Stepping out of her comfort zone.” she murmured like a satisfied mother hen. Hanzo didn’t react, instead watched Zaryanova head back to her weights. He glared.

* * *

 

After the Eichenwalde team flew off the next morning, Dr. Ziegler summoned Hanzo to the medbay to be present when she awoke Genji. 

He hovered over the side of his cot with his stomach in knots, turning his brother’s visor over in his hands. He expected Genji to jerk awake and was prepared to help subdue him. But when he came to, the cyborg was sluggish. His reflexes were slow and his movements became jerky without a warning. He greeted Hanzo cheerfully regardless of the state he awoke to find himself in, unaware of the strife he had caused. He asked after the mission, then after the team. Finally he requested to see his master and was told he was away on the mission to Germany. When Angela refused to reconnect his comm and then refused to let him leave the medbay, he took to pouting like a child.

“This reminds me of when I first awoke after the initial procedure, Angela-sama. It feels like something’s off with my wiring at the junctions. Are you sure everything is as it should be?” Genji asked his doctor. She nodded and continued taking notes, prodding him with queries and a sterile tongue depressor. 

“Do you truly not remember what happened?” Hanzo asked, and not for the first time. 

Genji sighed, “No, brother. Last I remember, Zaryanova was providing cover fire and Athena sent out that warning about the rockets. I turned because I felt a hostile approaching and then I was out. And now I’m here. How long has it been?” 

“A little over a week- but not by natural causes. We’ve been keeping you under to make sure you hadn’t been compromised.” Angela explained.

“Compromised? By what?” 

They told him about Zarya’s concerns during the battle, the unnaturalness of the entire situation. Hanzo clamped his mouth shut and let the doctor explain in more technical terms. She expressed her fear that they may have to upgrade his entire system and how she was keeping him in the medbay for observation. Genji gave a long-suffering sigh.

“I’m  _ fine.” _ he stressed. Then he frowned, “What I am, though, is hungry. And not for your vitamin shakes, Angela-sama.” He drew up a hand before she could go fetch what Hanzo knew from personal experience to be terrible hospital food. “What won’t upset my stomach? Crackers? Saltines?” 

“We have rice crackers in the kitchen. Not many. We’re overdue for a grocery run.” Hanzo offered, “I can go fetch them.” 

Mercy shook her head and put down her tablet on the counter against the wall. “No, allow me. I’m sure you two would like some time to catch up. I won’t intrude any longer.” 

Hanzo watched her leave and tried to think back to exactly when Dr. Ziegler had stopped giving him suspicious looks whenever he was left alone with his younger brother. 

At Genji’s request, Hanzo told him about what had gone on around the base while he was unconscious, starting with Talon’s attack. He told it as he had heard from McCree, from the arrival of the helicopters to the hacker’s interception, up until the fight on the roof. He excluded his breakdown upon landing, the anxiety that had swallowed him the days following Torbjörn and Angela’s weak diagnosis. Genji listened intently, face serious and cursing every once in awhile. Finally he threw up his hands, curtailing Hanzo’s explanation of the UN’s reaction to the Widowmaker’s loss when one of his arms got stuck that way and he had to help his younger brother set it back in his lap. 

“Enough, this is depressing! Winston will be sure to debrief me once they get back, and Angela won’t be gone forever.” Genji whined and grabbed at Hanzo’s shirt before he could retreat. “How’s the Russian fitting in? Any gossip? Wait, why am I asking you? You’re useless. Where’s Mei? McCree?” 

“Working.” Hanzo unclenched his brother’s hands from his sweatshirt and stepped back. Genji harrumphed and flopped back on his pillows. 

“Fine. Then you will just have to be my entertainment. Tell me,  _ nī-chan,  _ how are you and Jesse? You never did tell me what happened when you left the hangar.” 

Hanzo scowled at his little brother and didn’t answer. Genji took his silence as an invitation to form wild speculation. Hanzo tried shushing him multiple times, and fell to physically trying to silence him, but even hospitalized Genji’s robotic strength gave him an advantage.

Head ungracefully pinned under Genji’s arm, Hanzo was forced to listen to his brother’s triumphant crowing. 

“Come on,  _ nī-chan! _ I’ve spent too much time and effort on the two of you to be left in the dark like this!” 

“Let me go.” Hanzo ordered. 

“Not until you tell me what happened!” 

“So you can spread gossip? Nothing happened,” Hanzo lied through his teeth, “We simply spoke.” 

Genji slumped, disheartened, and Hanzo pulled himself to freedom. 

“You spoke?” Genji asked, voice more serious than it had been a moment ago. 

“Yes.” Hanzo said. It was true, they had spoken in the hall. 

“And you’re both okay? You’re not avoiding him and he’s not…?” Genji needled, sounding somewhat concerned. Hanzo puzzled over it, but answered with a hesitant nod. 

Genji nodded too. “That’s good. Healthy. Much better than I did in my first relationship.” 

His brother scowled, “This is hardly my first relationship.” 

“But this is your first relationship not approved by the clan, and I somehow I doubt McCree would likely be handpicked by the elders for their honorable heir. Unless you let your wild side out in your years of exile, and somehow I doubt that even more.” Genji snorted. Hanzo ducked his head and rubbed a spot of grime off his brother’s mask. 

_ “Nī-chan, Makkurī no aijō o moteasobu na. _ ” His voice made Hanzo look to him, confused.[2]

“I am not.”  

“No, Hanzo you…” Genji made a frustrated noise. “You have a habit of thinking too much. You think with your head for the most part, and think with your heart when it is least appropriate, as if to make up for being such a hardass the rest of your life and… Sometimes it’s good. But mostly, it’s self destructive. I’m not saying you’d hurt him, at least not on purpose. And not without regretting it. But that’s just it. The regret, your mistakes, they eat you up. And I don’t want to see you fall because of something that should be good.”

Hanzo faltered. He was saved having to answer when Genji’s face lit up at the sound of approaching footsteps. It was more than one set, the doctor had brought company. 

“-birds and the bees like a damn kid, Angie. I tell you a story and you spin it into a lecture, only most parents ain’t got a lab to whip up a- whoa there!” A metal hand reached out to pull back the powder blue curtain, and there stood Jesse, Angela, and Fareeha. Jesse looked slightly flushed, Angela aloof, and Fareeha’s face was a mix of disbelief and amusement.

“Angela-sama!” Genji cried, arms going up to make grabby hands, “Did you-?”

She stepped forward and handed Genji a pink packet of crackers and a juice box. He gathered them onto his lap and began the process of getting his lagging limbs to cooperate in aligning the straw to the hole it was meant to punch through. 

“Genji-kun! Nice to see you back in the land of the livin’!” McCree stepped up next to Hanzo. “Hey sweetheart. Faree and I are gonna head out tomorrow for a some groceries. Your turn to cook. Any requests?” 

The cowboy’s presence brought a new light to mood of the medbay. He piled Genji with the goings-on of the base, from Mei’s baking escapades to the Russian’s well meaning but terribly executed attempts to get the rest of them on a more stringent fitness regiment. 

Angela came and went, Hanzo settled himself on the couch by the doctor’s office. The gunslinger kept to his feet, pacing circles around Genji’s bed as he recounted the attack and the Reaper’s unsettling presence, complete with exaggerated reenactments. 

Fareeha excused herself for a few minutes and returned holding out her handheld. On the small screen, Zenyatta’s face looked serenely upon them. 

“Hello, my friends.” 

“Master!” Genji shot up and lunged for the phone. Fareeha passed it over with a chuckle. The ninja was quick to turn on the holo feature and soon enough they were all looking at the monk. Behind him were banners swaying gently in a breeze, a wooden staircase and some toppled tables. 

“We have just arrived.” the omnic informed them, “Lena, Winston, and Reinhardt are out scouting, but Angela messaged us to let us know you were awake, and-” 

“AND WE WANTED TO CHECK UP ON YOU, MAN! You doin’ alright?” Lúcio momentarily knocked their camera sideways as he skated up to his teammate.

“I’m fine!” Genji’s grin was ear to ear. The worry still knotted in the pit of Hanzo’s stomach began to unwind. Zenyatta expressed his relief and Lúcio flashed a peace sign, the movement mirrored by Genji on their end. 

“We are not authorized to make this call.” The camera swung around to show Satya as she began to speak, but Lúcio’s fingers redirected the comm’s course back onto them. 

“Ignore her, Zen. She’s a killjoy.” Lúcio said solemnly, then broke out in another grin. “Yo, I see some red peekin’ from the corner, there! That my boy Mac?” 

“Hey Lulu,” Jesse bent over to get in the shot. Genji sputtered and batted his sarape away when it got in his face. “Where y’all at?” He squinted at the holo. “Are y’all… is that an honest-ta-god tavern?” He motioned for Hanzo to step closer and check with him, and the archer humored him. He gave a noncommittal grunt to indicate he couldn’t tell either way and tried to step back again, but was stopped when McCree swung an arm over his shoulders and anchored him there. Fareeha laughed at the displeasure to cross his face and hopped behind them to be included in the video. 

“I think it’s technically a brewery?” Lúcio was saying, and he turned to Zenyatta for confirmation. Zenyatta nodded and redirected their camera to Satya again, where she stood by what was clearly a small distillery across a wide wall of windows. 

“Think any of them taps still work?” Jesse asked, and he tilted his head down towards Hanzo’s ear. Quieter, he added, “‘Cause I'm feelin' an almighty thirst.” 

His voice at his ear brought up memories of a morning spent in a corner of the cowboy’s room, that same voice panting against his neck. Hanzo felt his face flush and Fareeha smacked the back of Jesse’s head from behind. 

The Eichenwalde team stayed on the line until their scouting group returned. Winston sent greetings after the pair got a scolding for goofing off on the job, and the call ended.

Hanzo and Angela remained constant, but Genji’s visitors rotated, some leaving to perform tasks around base and others popping in to say hello. Even the bodybuilder made an appearance- her visit quick and unpleasant as it became apparent she still did not take Genji as fully human. Fareeha followed her out, intent on maintaining the peace by talking weaponry and swapping stories about their time in the armed forces.  

During a lull when it was only the three of them, Genji asked Hanzo to fetch his tablet from his room, which he did. Then Genji spent the better part of two hours on a holo map chasing a red dot around what looked to be France.

Mei appeared for an early dinner, passing out bowls of dan dan noodles while Genji begged Angela for permission to eat them. When he was denied, Hanzo left to get more crackers and to collect laundry from the dryers. He lugged the basket upstairs to the medbay. He settled the huge plastic tub on the couch and plucked the crackers from the top of the pile and tossed them at Genji, who didn’t manage to catch them with his slowed reflexes. Hanzo was forced to go pick them up from the floor to hand them over personally, and Angela helped him fold.  

Jesse waltzed back in with Fareeha in tow, both in workout gear and sweaty from sparring in the ranges. Fareeha was fanning herself with one hand while the other tugged at the top of her sports bra. Jesse had foregone a shirt altogether, only wearing his hat, sneakers, and a pair of sweats. Hanzo noted with interest when Angela squeaked and busied herself with matching up socks to avoid looking at them. 

“So Winston just called Mei to tell us they’ll be back tomorrow morning with another recruit,” Jesse opened.

“And Zarya wasn’t happy.” Fareeha continued, diving into the doctor’s office to pull bottles of water from her small refrigerator. She handed one to Jesse and he kept talking even as he unscrewed the cap with his teeth. 

“It’s an omnic this time. From what I got, they were hostile- started shootin’ the second Reinhardt stumbled onto them.” He chugged half the plastic bottle and Hanzo quickly looked down at the shirt in his hands to keep from following Mercy’s example. McCree cleared his throat and went on, “Bastion unit, I think?” He turned to look over at Fareeha. She nodded. 

“They ceased fire long enough for Lúcio to set up a calming aura, and Zenyatta was able to talk them down. It was on-and-off for a while. Seeing Reinhardt seemed to make them revert back to their combat protocol.” 

“But then Lulu said they stopped. Talked to Zen some more, and he went ahead and recruited them.” 

“They may be the last Bastion unit still functioning. Zarya’s in the labs trying to make her case that it’s too dangerous to recruit a rogue omnic, but I think Reinhardt’s vouching for them.” Fareeha finished. 

“Reinhardt is vouching for an omnic that attacked them?!” Angela put down her task and gave the pair a wide-eyed look. 

“He said something about trusting a bird’s judgement?” Fareeha tried explaining, but only confused her further. Hanzo and Genji exchanged looks, and the younger shrugged. Jesse reached into his back pocket and pulled out his handheld, scowling as he read a new string of messages. He sighed, turned the screen off and pocketed it once more, only for Fareeha to yank it back out and input his passcode to read them herself. 

“Torb’s down in the labs now too. Mei’s gonna need some backup. I guess that’s my cue.” he sighed and stepped over to the couch to dig through the folded laundry for a shirt.

“Wouldn’t Reinhardt’s approval be enough to dissuade Torbjörn from protesting?” Fareeha asked the room at large, scrolling through the messages on his phone.    

Jesse settled on a red plaid shirt and fiddled with the catch on his prosthetic to pull the sleeve over and in. “Well, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink.” 

“A horse to water?” Genji piped up, slowly chewing on his crackers. 

“Is that another one of your English idioms?” Hanzo asked distractedly, busy trying to neatly fold a fitted sheet. “Or are the ones centered on horses reserved for foolish cowboys such as you?” 

Jesse’s face lit up, “Oh, I got a ton of those! There’s-” 

Angela cut him off before he could go any further. “If you make a joke about saving a horse, Jesse, so help me...” 

McCree turned his shit-eating grin on her instead. “Oh come now Angie, I know you know better than that!” 

“Do I? Do I even want to ask?” she covered the lower half her face with the dress shirt she was smoothing down.

“Well, I just mean if you’ve seen any westerns, you’d know,” he finished buttoning up his shirt and shot a sideways glance at Hanzo, caught his eye, and held, “It’s the cowboys that do the riding.” 

Hanzo carefully kept his expression neutral while everyone around them exploded into various exclamations of dismay and disgust. 

“Oh gods,  _ akhi, _ shut up!” groaned Fareeha.

“Please keep your flirting out of my medbay.” tutted Angela. 

“Get your own fucking room!” Genji flung the remains of his rice crackers at McCree’s face, then barked out a laugh and muttered,  _ ‘Ha! Fucking room.’ _ Hanzo was content to simply wait them out. Fareeha was still complaining, Genji was begging someone to acknowledge his pun, and then Jesse decided to lean over and hip check him, following up with an eyebrow waggle. Hanzo promptly smacked his smug face with the sheet he had in hand, ruining his progress.    

Jesse yelped and scrambled to keep his hat on. “What was that for!?” 

Hanzo gave him a dirty look, “For being lewd, and for the fact that your comment likened me to a horse.” As soon as he got the words out, Fareeha immediately shoved her fingers in her ears and began chanting  _ ‘la la la la la’.  _

“But it’s a compliment!” he rebuked, “I’m sayin’ you’re hung, sweetheart, what kinda guy don’t appreciate that?” 

Hanzo felt color rise to his cheeks. He opened his mouth and sputtered, “Y-You haven’t even-!” 

“Jesse, if memory serves-” Genji interrupted him. Hanzo turned on him and hissed,  _ “Hanasu nara, sono toki no koto o kyabakura de to tsutaeru yo!” _ [3]

Genji’s mouth snapped shut.  _ “Ja, hanasanai kata ga yoi ne?” _ [4]

“Okay, that’s enough excitement for the day. It’s getting late. McCree, get out of my medbay.” Angela began to push him past the curtain, “Go do as your gun is named and keep the peace.”  

Jesse whined but he went. Hanzo shot his brother one last warning look and got an innocent grin in return. 

“I will leave as well.” He began to gather his part of the laundry and turned to the doctor. “I have been shirking my responsibilities long enough. I am confident Genji is in good hands. Thank you for tolerating my paranoia today, Dr. Ziegler.” he said with a small bow. Angela smiled and waved him off. He followed Jesse out of the patient wing but paused when he heard the sound of heels hastening to catch up. 

“Actually Hanzo, before you go, do you have a minute?” Angela stopped him just as he made it to the medbay doors. She looked at him somewhat apologetically. “I have something to discuss with you, nothing too serious.” Jesse stopped in front of him, and both turned to look at her. She leveled Jesse with a look that dared him to interfere, and Jesse responded by raising his eyebrows and mouthing something at her pleadingly. Hanzo wasn’t sure what to make of their behavior. 

“I have time.” he answered cautiously, and Jesse let out a little strangled noise when Angela shot him a threatening look. 

“Perfect. Step into my office.” She stepped to the side and gestured to her door. Fareeha emerged from the patient's’ quarters at that moment and watched Hanzo move forward. 

“Oh, is it his turn now?” She asked, twinkling eyes on Jesse. Jesse turned to her and glared. 

* * *

 

Hanzo found Jesse idly switching between channels in the rec room when the doctor was through with him. He let the clack of his metal soles announce his presence, and when he saw Jesse stiffen, he began to speak, “I-” 

“Have a bone to pick with me. I know, sweetheart.” He paused the television and twisted to look at him over the back of the brown couch. “I’m sorry. I know you wanted to keep us private. I swear I didn’t mean to blab, but Angie’s got her ways and you bet I didn’t get such a pretty proposition when she dragged me into her office-” 

“If you would let me speak,” Hanzo heaved himself over the back of the couch and settled across from him, “You would find I was not about to berate you for spreading our private affairs, but now that you mention it-” He fell silent and chose to let that do the talking for him. At the other end of the couch, Jesse bit his lip nervously. Hanzo followed the motion with his eyes.  

“M’sorry?” he tried meekly, and Hanzo snorted. Jesse gaped and gestured wildly with his hands, “What? What’d I say now, Shimada?” 

“I do not mind.” he answered. Jesse didn’t seem to be following, so he elaborated, “It was I that first hinted to the others what transpired in Japan on the transport. It would be hypocritical of me to begrudge your confidence in Dr. Ziegler when the over sharing between Genji and I is what led us here.” 

“Led us here.” Jesse looked at him with his wide brown eyes. “And where is ‘here’, exactly?” 

Hanzo was suddenly overcome by a sense of déjà vu. He flicked his gaze to the screen frozen on some news report in Dorado. “Here as in…” 

_ “Amigos?” _ Jesse filled in, moving closer and raising an eyebrow suggestively. Self-satisfied and as insufferable as ever. But they were on level ground now, and Hanzo had enough confidence in himself and their standing to give his response. 

_ “Koibitotachi.”  _ he answered with a snide smirk, and Jesse’s grin fell away in confusion.[5]

“What was that, now?” he asked. 

“The word escapes me in English. Perhaps I could bother Athena for a translation?” He leaned into Jesse’s side as he spoke airily. 

“I’d appreciate that.” Jesse answered hesitantly, bringing his arm to rest around his shoulders. 

“Athena?” He waited until her logo lit the screen in front of them.

She answered in an inquisitive tone, “Yes, Agent Hanzo?” 

“Can you run a translation from Japanese to English for the term  _ ‘sekufure?’ _ ”[6]

“That don’t sound like-” Jesse caught on quick, but Athena was already processing his request.

“Translating:  _ sekufure, _ Japanese slang for- oh. I’m sorry, Agent. My filters won’t allow me to provide the direct translation. Would you like a general definition?” 

Hanzo pressed his hand against Jesse’s mouth to keep him from telling her yes. “No, thank you. That will be all.” 

“Yes, we do!” Jesse peeled his hand off, but Athena had already flickered off. “Athena!” He called her back, and Hanzo didn’t know how an AI whose only physical trait was the shape of the letter ‘A’ could look bemused, but she managed it. 

“Yes?” 

“Give me the definition!” 

“Of what, Agent?” 

McCree grinned, assured.  _ “Sekufure!”  _

“I’m sorry, Agent McCree, but my translation services are currently down.” Jesse’s face fell comically fast, “May I assist you in anything else?” she asked pleasantly, and Hanzo covered his mouth to keep from laughing. Jesse cast them both betrayed looks, then snapped and pointed at the screen. 

“Genji still in the medbay?” 

“Agent Mercy has yet to release Agent Genji from the medbay.” Athena confirmed. 

Before Hanzo could react, McCree had shoved a pillow in his face and pushed him down into the couch to vault over the back and run out of the room. Hanzo leaped up after him, but Jesse and his longer legs had a head start.

“Genji!” Jesse yelled once he had parted the blue divider to his makeshift room, Hanzo nearly crashing into his back at the abrupt stop, “What does  _ ‘sekufure’  _ mean?” 

Genji startled in bed with Mei next to him going through a toolbox. He looked to her, and Mei shrugged. 

“Did you run here?” he ignored the question, taking in Hanzo’s ruffled state. He ran a hand self-consciously through his hair and nodded.  _ “Sekufure?” _

_ “Jōdan no tsumori datta.” _ The elder brother answered.[7]

“Ah.” He turned to McCree, “Apologies, Jesse. I’m afraid I do not understand my brother’s antiquated slang. Have you tried asking Athena?”

Jesse let out an incredulous squawk, “You’re both fucking with me again!” Hanzo barked out a laugh at his lucky phrasing just as Angela stormed into the room wearing fluffy pajamas. 

“It is nearly midnight!’” she yelled, “The only one authorized to be here is Mei to check on Genji’s coolant, and if you are not both out in the hall and  _ in your own bedrooms  _ in one minute I will personally land you both in my medbay and you can stay here until your bones reset!” 

They, as McCree would say, booked it. 

Laughing, they ran down the halls as if a witch were at their heels. Jesse slowed to a stop once they reached the dorms and doubled over to catch his breath. 

_ “Whew!  _ Ain’t seen her that mad in ages!” He shot Hanzo a wild grin, face flushed and unapologetically happy. “Ya ain’t gonna tell me what  _ ‘sekufa- _ whatever’ means, are you?”

“No.” Hanzo didn’t even bother to keep his own grin at bay.

“Fine, fine.  _ Me doy.” _ he straightened up and continued the trek to their rooms at a slow walk. “You at least gonna tell me what you went and found me at the rec room for if it wasn’t to yell at me?”[8]  

Hanzo stalled to a stop just as they reached his door. He had forgotten. “I came to tell you…” 

“Yeah?” Jesse had stopped too, and he turned to him with his head tilted expectantly. 

“That Dr. Ziegler said I’m… clean.” 

“Oh.” 

The buoyant air around them thickened with a sense of anticipation. Jesse licked his lips and spoke again. 

“Uh… me too.”  

“I see.” Hanzo said, trying and failing to ignore the way Jesse’s eyes had darkened at the implication.

“She said-” 

_ “‘In your own bedrooms’.” _ Hanzo repeated, trying his best to encompass the primal fear the doctor’s voice had invoked. “She would know.”

Jesse laughed, “Wanna risk it?” 

Hanzo leaned against the wall to consider it. He shook his head. “You are childhood friends. She has a soft spot for you, you would survive relatively unscathed. I doubt I could get off so easily.” 

“I mean, you may not be able to get  _ yourself  _ off so easy, but if you let me take a shot at it-” 

“Jesse.” he deadpanned. Jesse laughed again good-naturedly. 

“That a no?” 

“That’s a no.” 

“Well alrighty then,” He tipped his hat, and walked backwards down the hall.  _ “Buenas noches, _ pardner.” 

_ “Oyasumi,” _ he called back.[9] Hanzo pressed his passcode into the pad by his door and slid it open. He stepped inside, dragged the scarf from its knot atop his head and let his hair fall to barely brush over his shoulders. 

He adjusted the room temperature, brushed his teeth, went through his nightly routine trying in vain to convince his mind to think of anything other than the flash of Jesse’s teeth when he smiled. The feeling of the curve to his lips as he kissed him, a laugh still caught at the edge of his pleading voice. 

When he sat at the edge of his bed, he didn’t see his hands as he worked to detach the protective casing from his legs. All he saw were brown eyes blown wide, flushed scruffy cheeks and spit-slick lips. He stood and headed for his bathroom, tugged off his sweatshirt and worked the taps until the heat of the water matched his liking.

He showered and refused to touch himself when the heat of the room reminded him of panting breaths and a gasping  _ ‘please’  _ spoken against the skin at his chest. The weight of him in his hand, the strength of his metal hand digging into muscle. The way his voice, usually so low and commanding, had risen to a whine as he  _ begged.  _

The water turned off, he dressed and headed to bed. This was nothing out of the norm, at least not for the past week. The memory of their small shared moment had tormented him from the moment he fled the cowboy’s room with the sound of his laughter at his back. 

He didn’t know what he expected when he sought him out the morning before the mission. He didn’t know if he would go back and do it again if he had known the affliction that would overcome him.  

He knew it was probably too late to go make himself tea. He shut his eyes and tried to fall asleep by force of will alone to keep himself from marching right back to Jesse’s room, Mercy’s threats be damned. 

* * *

 

The pair that had been dead set against the idea of recruiting an omnic appeared as a leery duo to watch as the transport made its descent. Zaryanova and Torbjörn stood at the mouth of Gibraltar’s warehouse, cagey and wary as the rest of the team came out in welcome.

Winston was well on his way to becoming a competent commander. When he ordered nobody have any weapons on their person when Bastion was introduced, even the taciturn ones showed up empty handed. Torbjörn held a welding torch, but only because he was in the midst of finalizing repairs to the tower a helicopter had crashed against. The last step would be to adjoin the fallen satellite dish to its peak. 

Mei watched, rising to her tiptoes as if that would help her see better into the transport as its walkway lowered. Fareeha and McCree stood at her other side, having put off their trip down to town in favor of being there to welcome the new recruit.  

Winston was the first one out. He was speaking to Satya as they made their way down, discussing how to justify to the public the fact that their first recruit following the end of the probation was a virulent omnic. Winston seemed excited, Satya’s expression was chagrined. Next came Lúcio on his skates, music blasting from his suit, the effect instantaneously calming to all within its radius. 

Then came the two omnics. Zenyatta’s lights flickered amiably as he spoke soothingly to the enormous Bastion unit lumbering beside him onto the Watchpoint grounds. They were roughly the size of the knight when he was out of his armor, Hanzo noted right when he stepped out behind the pair, followed by Lena. 

Mei was the first to cautiously step up, eager to see if her understanding of basic omnic speak held up after years of no practice. 

“Hello! I’m Mei! It’s nice to meet you!” she said. 

“Boo doo boo doo!” It chirped at her happily. Hanzo stepped closer as well, intent on protecting her in case the omnic fell back to their violent ways. Once he had stopped behind Mei, he noticed a small yellow bird nesting high atop what constituted as its shoulder. He frowned. 

“Doo-woo, dwee hoo bwoo dweet!” Its visual sensory screen tilted down to examine him, and Hanzo reflected it matched the blue of the sky. The bird perked up as if it had been called and flew over to land on Bastion’s offered hand. The hand lowered and stopped in front of the archer. 

He stared. 

“She says her name is Ganymede.” Zenyatta translated, and Mei gave a small fist pump. 

“I understood! Lúcio! I understood!” She called out. The musician laughed and shot her a thumbs up. Hanzo continued to stare at the little bird, unsure of how to react. McCree stepped up beside him and bent at an angle to tip his hat at the puff of yellow feathers. 

“Well howdy there, Ganymede.” He straightened up and repeated the greeting to Bastion. “Welcome to Overwatch! Let’s introduce you to the others now, shall we?”

The omnic beeped in agreement, and Hanzo fell behind as they walked over to Zarya and Torbjörn. Hanzo pulled out his phone and snapped a picture to send to Genji. Lúcio skated off, pulling Reinhardt and Lena with him and citing a need to visit medical. 

“Bwee bwoo  _ chirr  _ beep woo? Doo wee boop.” Bastion bent down to speak to the shorter of the pair.

“She asks if you are building someth-” Zenyatta relayed for the engineer, who cut him off. 

“No, I’m  _ rebuilding _ the mess Talon left us with, and if that tin can doesn’t keep its gatling gun to itself and causes more trouble-!” 

“Then I would have no problem-” Zarya cut in, but Mei loudly spoke over her. 

“She ASKED if you were BUILDING something because she offered to HELP!” She yelled to get her point across. Zarya fell silent again. 

The two looked at Bastion, then Zenyatta, then settled on Mei. 

“To help?” Zarya repeated, like she didn’t believe the word.

“Yes.” said Mei. 

“Aye, fat lotta good that thing’ll do,” Torbjörn went on, having no need for a translator. “All its usefulness got branded ‘worthless’ when it got turned into a killing machine. What’s it expecting to help with?” 

“You know, it wasn’t me that asked. You may want to ask Bastion.” Mei’s voice was bordering on fed up. Hanzo once again stepped forward to defend her if necessary. Bastion gave a sad whir, then let out a meek series of beeps, taking Torbjörn by surprise. 

“A garden? You want to help me build a garden?!” He squinted his eye up at Bastion, completely suspicious. “Well I don’t see the harm in it. We’ve got room. But I don’t have time. You can build it if you’d like, just be sure to get approval from Winston first.”

Bastion whistled, and Ganymede flew happy circles around her head. Jesse and Fareeha left to market, and Mei took Hanzo and Bastion’s hands to lead a tour through the base while Zenyatta floated behind them. Hanzo took in Mei’s smile and felt a sense of peace return to the Overwatch base in the wake of Talon’s attack. 

* * *

 

The peace didn’t last long. 

Their group rounded the corner for the main entrance to the Watchpoint, Mei chattering away about Angela’s plans to throw a Halloween party in the big room. Even months after his arrival, they had yet to put actual use to the main foyer. 

Zenyatta had broken away from the group when they reached the medbay. Hanzo didn’t follow him half out of respect to their privacy, and half out of reluctance to leave Mei alone with Bastion. He was in the midst of running a mental checklist on what he would need for tonight’s dinner when his pocket beeped. He pulled out his handheld to see Mercy’s call sign flash on its screen. His heart jumped to his throat.

He accepted the call and brought the phone to his ear, “This is Agent Hanzo.” 

_ “Aniki?  _ It’s Genji. I had to, eh, steal Angela’s phone. McCree’s not answering his comm, is he with you?” Hanzo felt relief wash over him, then hastened to answer. 

“No, he and Fareeha left on a grocery run. Why? Is something wrong?” 

Genji made a high-pitched noise that dragged on too long for everything to be alright. “Maaaybe. Yes. We’ve got incoming.” 

Then the alarms started blaring. 

“I’ve detected intruders driving some sort of all-terrain vehicle. They have broken the line of the trees and are taking the main road. ETA at two minutes- I’m sorry Winston, my scanners couldn’t pick them out in the foliage.” Athena announced.

“Main road.” Mei turned to Hanzo, “They’ll try to get through the main doors!”

Bastion gave a shrill cry of alarm, and Hanzo cursed the fact that no one but the omnic was currently armed. “Genji!” He barked into the comm, “Explain!” 

From his earpiece came the rest of the teams’ voices. 

“Tracer here! Where should I head to, big guy?” 

“IF TALON BELIEVES WE WILL BE TAKEN BY SURPRISE YET AGAIN, THEY WILL FEEL THE STRENGTH OF MY HAMMER!”

“LET THE COME! I’VE UPGRADED THE TURRETS!” Torbjörn matched his friend in volume, and Hanzo winced as he ran for his room, abandoning Mei and Bastion to arm himself. She raced off to the labs to grab her blaster. 

“Genji!” Hanzo said again, urging his brother to share what he knew. Bastion trundled after him, beeping at him in concern until he reached the stairwell and couldn’t follow. 

“Yo!” His voice came from the comm in his ear on the main line, so Hanzo shut off and pocketed the phone. He stormed into his room and grabbed Storm Bow from its spot atop a shelf. “So, funny story-” 

“Genji…” Hanzo’s voice had taken an edge, and Genji laughed nervously. He slid down the rails instead of taking the stairs. Ganymede had taken to chirping loudly, and Bastion still looked lost. 

“Technically, this is McCree’s fault.” Genji was saying. “He’s got seniority, and he authorized the trace.” 

“Agent Genji? If you have something to tell us, please be clear.” Hanzo picked out Winston’s voice among the racket.  

“Remember our last day in Japan?” Genji asked. Reinhardt and Lena crashed in from the hallway, and then Hanzo heard it. 

Laughter. Crazed, high-pitched laughter.Then a loud crash. The walls shook and the main doors rattled on their hinges when something rammed into them from the other side and Hanzo struggled to keep his footing.

“Well that coulda gone better! Kinda ‘xpected the doors to fall in, y’know?” Came a slightly faint voice from outside. Hanzo remembered a hole blasted in the roof of his childhood home and grimaced. Then he remembered McCree at the edge of the lake, standing beside him as he told him about convincing Genji to put a trace on the ‘little one’.

He closed his eyes and sighed. The doors blasted open with the force of an explosion that rocked the entire base. The lights flickered off, and Hanzo took shelter behind the omnic, and Lena hid behind Reinhardt. The bird had flitted off to safety at the first sign of trouble. 

Smoke billowed into the base, a thick murky grey. The silhouettes of the Junkers were backlit dramatically by the midday sun outside. A behemoth and a lanky scarecrow with flaming hair. 

Truly, life in Overwatch was never quiet.  

“Ohoho!” said the blond one, stepping out of a smoking jeep and taking in the view of the Watchpoint with outstretched arms. Hanzo felt dismay at realizing his height was understated standing next to his partner. “So this’s where we’ve been pinging back to, ey? Nice digs! Real shiny!” 

“Who planted the bug?” The one sporting a pig theme growled, voice like an engine revving. 

Lena stepped forward, and Hanzo drew back a scatter arrow. “Who’re you?” she asked.

“Jamison Fawkes, or Junkrat, if you’d like. My friend here’s Roadhog.” Junkrat surprised them all by actually answering in an almost polite tone. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind answerin’ the question- who planted the bug?”   

“What bug?” Lena asked, bewildered. 

Junkrat grinned, wide and delighted. “Wrong answer, mate!” They took refuge behind the knight’s barrier when the large one swung an enormous arm and fired his gun. Shrapnel flew, and Lena looked at Hanzo with the most confused face she could muster.

Mayhem followed. Overwatch regrouped, then attacked. Hanzo found himself too busy dodging a sharp hook and a tire engulfed in fire to aim properly. His scatter arrows were too risky with the rest of his teammates moving around in such close proximity. Lena’s chronal accelerator was almost out of charge, Bastion was too befuddled to shoot, and Reinhardt was trying his best to keep the barrier up. While they weren’t necessarily aiming to kill, the Junkers were. Their attacks were ruthless, and when Reinhardt called for them to fall back behind his shield, Mei and Lúcio appeared in the hallway. All three of them yelled out a warning for them to stay back. Bastion beeped what Hanzo assumed was similar advice.

Mei paid them no heed, supporting her shooting arm in her grip while she took careful aim. 

“G’day!” hollered Junkrat, saluting with his gun. Then Mei fired. 

Hanzo, Lena, Reinhardt, and Bastion let out a collective sigh of relief when her second and third shots landed true and both of their opponents stood suspended in ice. 

“Did you get them?” Genji asked in their ears. 

“Mei did.” Hanzo answered, panting. Lena strode over to land a kick on the smaller hunk of ice. 

“We  _ just  _ bloody managed to fix this place up, you blasted- argh!” She kicked the other one too for good measure. 

“Nice.” Genji’s voice was full of pride. “Zenyatta says our truck’s coming up the back road. If you hurry, you may get to McCree before Winston lets his blood pressure get the best of him.” 

Hanzo left the rest of them to deal with the criminals, just as done with this mess as he was when they were in Japan. He headed out the back exit to where the smaller gravel road curved around the base and stopped at the edge as he watched McCree and Fareeha drive up, windows down and country music blasting. 

“Plenty of stop signs, birds on the power lines, shot in the daylight on county road-” He managed to make out the sound of a man crooning to the chords of a guitar, and the car pulled to a stop right next to him, hovering and picking up dust. 

Fareeha kicked her door open and immediately headed to the back to begin piling her arms with bags. Hanzo came up behind the bed of the truck and judged the music coming from the cabin with a critical eye. “Is this man singing a love song-?” 

“Yup.” Jesse answered prematurely, and jumped out to help Fareeha with the groceries. The man on the radio kept singing, “Plenty of full moons, plenty of me and you, plenty of memories in the rearview-”

“-To his truck?” Hanzo raised an eyebrow. Jesse was shooed away by Fareeha, arms already laden with canvas bags and she walked up to the base without breaking a sweat.

“Yup.” he repeated without a hitch. 

“Are either of your comms online?” 

“Uh… yeah? Mine should be, but I think Faree busted hers last night in the ranges. I-” he went to pull it from his back pocket and found himself empty-handed. “Oh. Huh. Nope, guess I left it in my room. Didn’t put in the earpiece today either, shit. Sorry. Somethin’ happen?” 

“We have guests, apparently.” 

“Guests?” Jesse asked. 

Hanzo quietly led him back into the base. Past the warehouse, he skirted the labs to avoid Winston, and stopped once they reached the foyer. Zenyatta and Angela had joined the group, walking circles around the icicles and shouting out ideas for how to move them onto the freight elevator to put them in the cells. Jesse whistled.

“Well I’ll be! It’s the Dorado pair!” he exclaimed, then he eyed the wreckage around them and winced. “Oh, fuck. Oh crap. They traced the bug, didn’t they?” 

Hanzo nodded.

“Darlin’ give it to me straight, how dead am I?” he asked, and Lúcio gave a loud gasp from across the room. 

“Dorado! Woody! What did you call that hacker the night of the attack?!”

Jesse looked over Hanzo at Lúcio, “Uh, Sombrita. Why?” 

“Sombra!” Lúcio was jumping up and down on his skates. “I knew that name rang a bell! Sombra are the ones that dug up the dirt on LumériCo that started the protests in Mexico! They’re insane, man! Do you think this hacker’s with them?” 

“Could be.” Jesse’s face had screwed up in concentration. He glanced up to where the dorms were with a frown, “But why would she be workin’ for Talon, then? Do you know any more about this Sombra group?”

Lúcio was kept from answering when they heard the oncoming rumble of a fast approaching, and very pissed off gorilla. 

“MCCREE!”   

Hanzo left to help Fareeha unpack the groceries. He had dinner to cook, and apparently two ‘guests’ to add to the lot. While he had expected for the pair to be handed over to the authorities as they had last time, Satya surprised him by entering the kitchen with a sour look on her face hours later. 

“They’re being recruited.” she said. Hanzo blinked. 

“What?” 

“Your-” she paused, pulled a face and considered her words. “Your  _ cowboy  _ recruited them. Or tried to. He convinced Winston that their knowledge and  _ criminal prowess  _ could prove useful to us. But they haven’t accepted. They will be spending the night in the cells by choice. I am here to pick up their food, and to tell you we will not be attending the usual evening meal. Agents McCree, Lúcio, and I are going to look into a lead we may have regarding the hacker.” 

She helped him dish out the food on trays, stalled long enough for a few of the rest to pile into the mess hall, and was gone. Dinner was blessedly uneventful. Hanzo left the washing up to Reinhardt and Torbjörn, and headed to the medbay to pay a visit to his brother. 

Angela kindly ushered him out at 2300, bidding him to rest. He returned to his room and shut the door behind him, let his hair fall, turned down the dial on the aircon unit. He pulled off his lounging clothes, brushed his teeth, stepped into the shower. 

He stepped out of the shower, brushed his hair, pulled on his underwear, and then there was a knock on his bedroom door. 

Hair slicked back and dripping on his shoulders from the shower, he exited the bathroom. He reached into his closet and picked a shirt at random, tugging on a  _ gi _ without bothering to tie it closed properly. It fell to the tops of his thighs, and Hanzo couldn’t be bothered with modesty to find pants when the clock showed it was 23:25. They knocked again.

He wrenched the door open and found McCree standing at the other side. 

“Hey honey!” He said, bright and cheerful. Hanzo glared up at him, confused how he could have so much energy after such a long day. “Winston okay’d a mission to Dorado to look into this Sombra business- happened to align with a favor the Mexican government called in. He didn’t want to accept because it involves LumériCo and their big ol’ mess, but it gives us an in. Speaking of ins, you in?” 

“In?” Hanzo repeated, tired and bleary eyed. 

“Yeah, for the mission. Come with us?”  

“I suppose.” Hanzo answered, and got a beam in return. He shifted to put his weight on the doorframe. “And you couldn’t just message me?”

“Lulu stole my phone.” he explained, “And then Winston confiscated it.” 

Hanzo’s shoulders slumped as he looked at him questioningly. Jesse shrugged helplessly. “Long story.” 

“Am I to hear it tonight?” he asked, hand going up to cover a yawn. 

“Naw. I mean, I would but,” he gestured at Hanzo’s attire, lingering on his exposed legs. “Ain’t you goin’ to bed?” 

“I could be convinced to stay awake a while longer.” 

“Oh?” Jesse answered, inflection high with interest. Hanzo closed his eyes, realizing the implication of his words. He considered the day they had just had, and considered that perhaps his exhaustion would be enough to lull him to sleep without having to be tormented by memories of the cowboy in their most intimate moment. 

But Jesse’s face was open and hopeful, and Hanzo reflected that no, it most likely would not.

He was exhausted, and Jesse was brimming with energy. With a sigh that was almost a laugh, he reached over the threshold to grasp at his sarape and haul him past the door to slide it shut. Then he promptly shoved the cowboy against it. 

The happy little noise that Jesse gave at finding himself once again backed against a wall brought an urgency to Hanzo’s movements. The hat drifted to the floor. He unwound the sarape from around his shoulders and draped it over his shoulder for safekeeping. Next he went for the half-unbuttoned shirt and asked, “You mentioned going on your knees?”

“Fuck, yes.” He untucked the sleeve from his prosthetic and let Hanzo finish pulling the shirt off, hands immediately going up to run over the hair on his broad chest. “You want me to?” 

Hanzo hummed, not agreeing but not turning down the idea of his own suggestion. Jesse reached his metal hand between them to push up at his chin. Hanzo looked up and met his eyes, then closed them when Jesse leaned down for a kiss. 

Despite the act they had spoken of, Jesse made no move to draw away from his lips. He kissed him, deep and good, his beard scratching at Hanzo’s cheek as he slowly led him backwards towards the bed. 

There was no mission pressing at the back of his mind, no worry that the others would grow to suspect. There was just the two of them, and the yellow light emanating from the bathroom that lit Jesse’s dark skin in a hazy glow. He felt his hands reach down to tug loose the lazy knot of his obi and snake beneath his robe to wrap around his waist when the blue fabric fell to the ground. He held him close, and in the moments between the final few steps and the moment the back of his knees made contact with the edge of his bed, Hanzo basked in the feeling of being enveloped in so much warmth.

When he had first allowed himself to put thought into his fledgling attraction, he had thought his height a disadvantage. Not accustomed to giving in any control, he had pondered at the logistics of moving forward with a man such as McCree, so loud and full of life. He needn’t have worried. Nothing felt better than when Jesse wrapped him in his arms, a steady, heavy presence all around him. He fell back onto the mattress and McCree followed, settling on top of him, everywhere all at once. 

Usually Hanzo would take the lead, make demands and expect them to be met. But now he was tired and pliant, murmuring his surprise when Jesse didn’t hasten to move them along quicker. It was like nothing Hanzo had ever experienced before, this calm. The quiet attention Jesse paid to the underside of his jaw as Hanzo sighed, pressing kisses from beneath his ear to the dip of his clavicle, down to a supple breast to latch onto a pebbled nipple. His  _ gi _ and the sarape were shoved from his shoulders, and Hanzo tried to sit up, only to be pushed back down against the sheets.

“Hey now, none of that. It’s my turn, isn’t it?” 

“Your turn?” Hanzo asked, mind clouded by contentment. He sat up and used his elbows to prop himself up, feeling his  _ gi _ slide further off his shoulder. 

Jesse smiled. “Yeah, my turn.” Hanzo’s breath caught when the only word he could conjure to describe Jesse’s mood was  _ adulation _ . “Let me love on ya, darlin’. Just look at you.” 

Hanzo exhaled and pulled him forward to press their lips together again. He heard the jingle of his boots hitting the ground, and then Jesse moved to crawl over him properly. Hanzo tilted his head back to allow it, determined not to break their kiss. 

“Gorgeous.” Jesse muttered, teeth biting down lightly on Hanzo’s bottom lip, and he had to swallow a whimper. “So fuckin’ gorgeous, have I ever told you?” 

Hanzo shook his head, not trusting himself to speak when he felt McCree’s knee push to press between his legs. Then it drew back, and was replaced with Jesse’s hips going down to grind against him.  

He supposed perhaps Jesse felt he had something to repay, but his own desperate ministrations the morning of the mission to Siberia seemed to pale in comparison to the way Jesse cradled his face in his hand and dipped his head down to kiss him slow and sweet as his hips set a rhythm to help his erection along. He panted his name against his parted lips. 

“Jesse-”   

He drew back, pushing himself up so their bodies no longer touched, supported by his robotic arm. The other stroked down his side. 

“Can I?” he asked, fingers tugging at the waistband of his boxer briefs and dark brown eyes trained intently on Hanzo’s face. He nodded. 

“Yes.” 

They joined the boots on the floor. Jesse leaned back until he was almost straddling him, admiring him. Hanzo took the chance to do so himself, taking in his barrel chest, the dip of muscle and softer flesh around his middle. Thick arms smattered with scars. There was a bullet wound on his right shoulder, old and faded but puckered still. Evidence of burns creeped up from where his prosthetic joined past the elbow. His eyes trailed down, to thighs thicker than his own, and settled the telltale line pressing urgently against the zipper of his pants. Suddenly, Hanzo was reminded of the comment about horses. 

_ “Que diablos hice para merecer esto?” _ Jesse’s hushed Spanish brought Hanzo’s attention back to the present. He felt heat curl in his stomach at the unknown words, alight with wonderment.[10]

He didn’t ask for a translation. Instead he reached for his belt, pulled, and pushed it off the bed as well. He was kept from going after the jeans when Jesse scooted back and fell to his knees at his bedside. 

“What are you-?” he didn’t manage to finish his sentence. Jesse gripped his legs and pulled, Hanzo dragged the sheets with him until his ass nearly made it off the edge of the bed. “What-” 

Jesse shushed at him, murmuring the noise just above his knees where synthetic flesh wove in with natural skin. 

“What are you…?” He tried to question again, but then Jesse began mouthing at the skin there, scarred over so many times Hanzo hadn’t known it retained the ability to feel so much. His breath stuttered. He gasped, his hand went down to bury itself in brown hair while the other clenched at his increasingly rumpled sheets. Jesse’s free hand went up, carefully skating past his center to push at his chest till he laid back down. 

His leg was swung over his shoulder, and Jesse moved onto the next, mirroring what he had done to the other. His hand wrapped around his calf, where Hanzo knew he felt next to nothing, but now somehow felt alight. His mouth traveled up, beard scraping against the soft skin at the back of his thigh trailing kisses, or stopping and leaving purple marks as he went. 

This kind of treatment was foreign, completely foreign. His cock lay abandoned, untouched and pressed against his stomach and leaking already. The anticipation as Jesse reached the place he yearned to be touched was ruining him, and he wasn’t prepared when he finally felt a warm hand reach over and run through the trail of hair running down his stomach to end at a nest at the base of his cock. His hand gripped him, thumb moving to pull back at his foreskin then returning to smear the dot of precum at the head. All the while Jesse bit to darken the bruise he had sucked at his inner thigh. Helpless, Hanzo breathed his name like a prayer, rewarded by a chuckle ghosted right over where his hand kept stroking. 

“Can I?” Jesse’s voice was a deep rumble, the sound of it sent shivers running down his back.

“Y-yes.”

Warmth. Jesse McCree was warmth, from his smile to his kisses to his words. It made sense, that if the creations of his mouth were warm, then to be sheathed within that mouth would be scorching. 

“F-fuck… Jesse!” The word fell from his lips, unnatural, but the only word that fit the moment, chased by a name that came like air for how often Hanzo had been gasping it out. His fingers gripped harder at Jesse’s hair, earning himself a pleased little groan that he felt reverberate against his dick as his head bobbed. With a jolt, Hanzo realized he  _ liked that, _ and tugged again. Jesse pulled off, and Hanzo watched his eyes seek his. He opened his mouth and held Hanzo’s gaze as he licked up his length, then broke eye contact to dip lower, then lower still, and Hanzo froze up when he realized where his trajectory would lead him.    

“I am not doing that.” 

Jesse reemerged, and Hanzo had to smile for a second at the mess his hair was in. “What?” 

“If you expect me to reciprocate, then reconsider.” he warned. Jesse frowned at him, contemplative.

“Alright… so is that a no or…?” he trailed off.

“Or what?” 

“Are you tellin’ me to stop?” He propped himself up on his elbows on the edge of the bed, pushing Hanzo further onto the bed to get a look at him.  

“N-no…?” he shifted, a bit uncomfortable. Jesse caught on and backed off. 

“I’ma need ya to sound a little more sure there, darlin’.” 

Hanzo smacked the side of his head with his thigh. “You may proceed if you are not under the false impression I will follow in your example. Is that plain enough for you, gunslinger?”

“As day, sunshine. Turn over for me.” When Hanzo leveled him with a glare but made to turn, he stopped him, “Wait! Where’s your lube? I know Angie gave you some, she sent me packin’ with more than a year’s supply, bless her heart.” 

“Lube?” Hanzo asked.

He wriggled his metal fingers pointedly. Hanzo nodded at the drawer of his bedside table, and Jesse only had to reach an arm to get at the supplies. Hanzo turned over. Jesse went back to nuzzle at the back of his neck, hands tracing the dip of his back, followed by his lips. He obeyed whispered orders, moving farther onto the bed to allow Jesse to climb onto it, to settle over the back of his legs and use one hand to spread him open. The other reached under to wrap around his middle and lift, and Hanzo jolted at the first puff of breath against his entrance. 

“Are you-”  _ Sure, _ he didn’t get out, because then Jesse applied his tongue. 

He could do little but ride it out, turning his head so that his cries would be muffled by his pillow even as he heard Jesse make a disappointed noise behind him. But that didn’t stop him from lavishing Hanzo with the most exquisite pleasure he had ever experienced.

Jesse’s mouth was quickly becoming Hanzo’s favorite thing, and he mourned the fact he wasn’t kissing it at that moment. His hands scrabbled to find purchase on something, anything. One was clenched, white knuckled around red wool and the other was clamped over his mouth. 

The warmth abandoned him. He couldn’t quite swallow the protesting moan that escaped him. 

“C’mon, sweetheart. Let me hear ya.” 

Hanzo couldn’t answer. Jesse’s hands reached for him, turning him over so he lay on his back, then they reached for the hand over his mouth and intertwined their fingers. Without anything to stem the flow of senseless words that threatened to spill out, spill out the truth of his affection and the breadth of the  _ happiness  _ he felt, to simply be here, be with him. To exist. 

It was too much for Hanzo to confess, and too much for Jesse to hear. So he fell back on the only choice he found he had.    

_ “Shimei no ma nete mo samete mo, boku wa itsumo kimi no koto bakari kangaete iru.” _ [11] his voice came out breathy, the words spoken between sighs and gasps for air. He heard the sound of tearing foil, and a hand abandoned its grip on his thighs, and Hanzo fell back onto the bed. That same flesh hand moved to turn him onto his side, then reach in front to pump his cock.  

_ “Kimi no…”  _ his voice hitched, spilling into a whine when the warmth of his mouth left him to be replaced with the press of a metal finger,  _ “Kimi no koto ga atama kara hanarenai.” _ [12]

Jesse’s lips brushed against the swell of his ass, “You know I ain’t got a clue what you’re saying.” 

“That’s the point.” he ground out.

Jesse frowned, “That ain’t fair.”  

_ Not fair,  _ said the man with the voice that had haunted him since he let himself lay hands on him. His voice, deep and wrecked, murmuring, begging, had crept into his thoughts whenever he tried to keep it blank. Jesse McCree was a larger-than-life curse, and Hanzo was being consumed, burning from the inside out. Fire licked at his sides, a trail left in the wake of the hand that left him, twitching and leaking to reach around and grope at his chest. A finger of his prosthetic pushing its way into him. Slippery metal cold at first, but slowly gaining warmth as he persisted, slow, achingly slow, he added another. 

Hanzo moved onto his back, and without having to ask, Jesse surged forward as far at the fingers pressing into him would allow to kiss him. Sloppy, more a sharing of breath than an actual kiss. His hips moved to press back against Jesse’s fingers, the nearly feral cry threatening to rip from his throat as the pads of his fingers brushed over his prostate and he shuddered in Jesse’s embrace. Pushed to the edge, he desperately thought of how to warn Jesse, urge him forward or get him to pull back, draw his torment out longer.

_ “Ikisō!” _ he gritted out, for lack of knowing the English translation. Jesse went back to his knees, bent over and took him in his mouth once more.[13]

“Jesse!” He reached down to tangle his hand in his hair once more. He tried to go through what remained of his memory, to remember what Jesse had said when it was Hanzo that turned the cowboy into a desperate mess. He was dismayed to realize the memories didn’t offer any clues. “I’m-”  _ Ikisō. Iku, _ meaning to go, so, in English- 

“I’m going-!” 

And then Jesse crooked his fingers downwards, and the world condensed to a single blinding point. He closed his eyes and saw an explosion of light as a he quickly brought his hand up to stifle the wordless shout that rose from his throat. 

And then the world left, for a bit. He realized he was still awake when he registered McCree’s weight back on him, and the prickle of his beard against his shoulder. 

“Shh, shh, darlin’.  _ Despacito. Despacito, ándale cariño. _ Come back to me, now.”[14] Jesse drawled in his ear, hand playing with the ends of his black hair. Hanzo was faintly aware of the movement he could still feel between them. He realized, then, that Jesse had taken himself in hand. Hanzo wanted to sit up, push his hands away and bring him to climax instead, but he had no strength left in him. The dragons rested, sated, dead to all the world and Hanzo was one slow blink away from joining them. 

“Going?” Jesse asked, voice nearly intelligible as he drifted into dreams.

“I’d prefer it if you didn’t ask.” Hanzo managed to whisper. Jesse laughed, the sound soft and blending in with the darkness. 

“Cultural differences?” 

“Cultural differences.” he confirmed. 

* * *

 

Hanzo beat McCree to the shower the next morning, but he waited for the cowboy to be done washing up to walk down to the kitchen together for breakfast. They were the first to rise, and so Jesse set upon putting on a fresh pot of coffee and gathering ingredients for a pancake feast. He convinced Hanzo to go wait in the kitchen, seeing as he had been in charge of dinner the night before. Hanzo left the kitchen, scrolling through the news on his phone as he paced the dining room. 

"Good morning!” Came Genji’s voice from the doorway, with its filtered robotic tone. “Sleep well, brother?" 

Hanzo stilled to turn around and eye him suspiciously. He hadn’t received notice that Angela had released him from the medbay, which led him to believe the cyborg had snuck out. Any relief at seeing his brother on his feet dissipated at the mischievous aura he brought with him. He was carrying himself in a way that spelled trouble, and Hanzo was too tired to deal with him at the moment. He turned back around to head for the kitchen. McCree was pouring himself a cup of coffee, Hanzo could see him through the window looking in past the serving counter. 

"Don't you have somewhere to be? The medbay, for example _? _ " he asked his brother, sidestepping the question. 

"Oh, I’m not  _ going _ anywhere. But,” He paused long enough to draw Hanzo’s weary gaze back to him, “I heard you most certainly were, though.”

Behind them past the counter, there was the sound of a sudden intake of breath followed by the splash of fallen liquid and frantic coughing. 

“And good morning to you too, brotherfucker!” Genji called cheerfully with an arm outstretched in a wave. As Jesse hacked out a lung while doubled over with coffee dripping off his beard, Hanzo swallowed his mortification and turned to pierce his brother with a deathly glare. 

If looks could kill, Genji would be dead twice over. 

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “But Hanzo knows English!” you say, “He’s a fluent bilingual!” Listen, everyday talk and talk in the sack r 2 v different things and basically they dont cover dirty talk in college and hanzo has no prior experience with a foreigner and tbh i dont see that boy going out of his way to learn ok let me have this  
> Y’all can thank [sleepysak](http://archiveofourown.org/users/SleepySak) for Genji _going_ at the end there 
> 
> Up next: México lindo y queridooooo, si muero lejos de tiiiiiiiii 
> 
> Oh, and i’ve had the intent of making this into a series for a while now, and I finally put thought to keyboard so if you’re into symbra and you? wanna maybe read more in-this-verse’s shit from som’s or sym’s pov you? might wanna [check it out](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10058426)?
> 
> Translations!  
>    
> [1]Good morning. G’mornin, darlin’  
> [2]Brother, don’t mess around with Jesse’s feelings.  
> [3]If you speak, I will tell them about that time in the cabaret club!  
> [4]Well then, it’s best if I don’t say anything.  
> [5]Lovers, a couple  
> [6]Fuck buddies (kinda crass, very slang)(Let Athena say fuck)  
> [7]It was a joke.  
> [8]Me doy- I give up.  
> [9]Good night, good night.  
> [10]What in hell did I do to deserve this?  
> [11]All throughout the mission, asleep or awake, you were always on my mind.  
> [12]I can’t get you out of my head.  
> [13]I’m coming! (but the joke is that in japanese it’s ikisou, which actually directly translates as ‘I’m going’)  
> [14]Slowly, slowly, c’mon darlin’.
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks for reading! Thank you for your kudos and your comments and your never-ending wonderfulness that amazes and astounds me! Find me babbling on tumblr at [cantodelcolibri](https://cantodelcolibri.tumblr.com). Have a nice day!


	15. Lo Que Cambió Ayer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spot the musical reference!
> 
> See end notes for translations, hover over on pc for kanji

As it turned out, Zenyatta had been the one to go and blab to Genji.

“I really don’t know what makes you all think-” Genji accentuated his point by spearing a piece of melon with his fork, “-that my master is above gossip. His room is right across from yours, _aniki.”_ He sighed, a dramatic and doting sound. “But alas! He is young! He does not know any better.”

They were back in the medbay. Angela had stormed into the kitchen led by Athena’s helpful instructions to hoist Genji over her back and knock him into the ground. Hanzo had done nothing to help, and Genji whined pitifully at Mercy, begging for just a few more minutes of freedom. Jesse had taken mercy on the guy and braved Hanzo’s unforgiving nature to bring him leftover pancakes.

With Angela’s permission, of course.

“Young?” he asked. Genji offered him a piece of strawberry and he waved him off.

So instead he nodded and popped the fruit in his mouth. “Yes. He is only 20.”  

Hanzo, who had been re-organizing Mercy’s not-so-secret liquor cabinet in search of something that wasn’t fruit flavored vodka paused and whipped his head around to stare at Genji. Jesse mirrored the alarmed look on his face.

_“Hatachi?!”_ Hanzo asked, and Jesse turned to the cyborg just in case he deliberated. [1]

Genji spoke through a mouthful of fruit and syrup and pancake, “Yeah.”

“He has barely reached adulthood, and yet he is your teacher?!” Hanzo stood up, and Jesse frowned.

“How old did you think he was?” The younger brother laughed. The elder opened and closed his mouth, not unlike a fish. Even the pattern on his _gi_ looked like the scales of the _taiyaki_ Zenyatta had gotten him back in Hanamura.

“He took you under his wing while he was still a child.” Hanzo said, still making it sound like a question. Genji nodded then went off on a lecture about the absurdity of the idiosyncrasy to equate an omnic’s physical age to their mental one. Jesse snuck a hand into the space between Hanzo’s stomach and the worn half of his _gi_ where he kept his phone and pouted until Hanzo took it to type in the passcode. Jesse opened Mei’s contact and started a video call so she could show Bastion the way Genji was righteously stabbing the air with his fork.

* * *

 

When he convinced Winston to take on the LumériCo mission, Jesse had assumed his punishment following the Junkers’ attack was over with when he relinquished his phone to be confiscated.

Hoo boy, had he been wrong.

“What’re ya doin’, Jamie?” he tried for his most patient voice, he did. But there was only so much patience he could exhibit when he found the explosives expert crouched behind Winston’s drone with a detonator in hand and Bastion’s garden in his sights.

Honestly, it was impressive how he managed to fold in on himself so efficiently to hide considering his height. What gave him away? Mako sitting clear as day against the communications tower tossing up bread crumbs for the gulls.  

Jamison wheezed a nervous giggle and tried hiding the detonator in one of his pockets, but Jesse stretched out a hand and curled his fingers, and he handed it over while grumbling, “Just livening the place up a bit, Mr. McCree, sir. Or tryin’ to, at least.”

“Now how much more livening does this place need, Fawkes? Why,” he gestured to the garden, currently packed with people and omnics alike, “Look at ‘em! Instead of tryin’ to blow ‘em up, why don’t you go on over and join their lil’... what _are_ they doin’?”

“It wouldn’ta killed ‘em. And I dunno.” Jamison grunted and winced as he stood, still crouched over under the weight of his tire, joints popping as he rose. “Weird witchy stuff. I wouldn’t go near ‘em if I were you, mate.”

Jesse cast him an unconvinced look, then decided to deal with him later. “Mei’s lookin’ for you. If y’all’re serious about helpin’ in Dorado then you’d best giddy on up and go find her in the lab. She’s in charge of our civilian disguises for tomorrow, which you, Mr. Twenty-Five Million Pounds are sorely gonna need.”

“What? Zhou? Can’t it be someone else? How ‘bout that prim ‘n’ proper one, the tall one? I like her better.”

“Unfortunately, the feeling’s not mutual, and Satya don’t have that assignment. Off you go. Take yer body guard with ya.”

Junkrat complained but he did as told. It had been a tense week after they agreed on the offer to join, but Jamison admitted it beat other contracts. And jail. They were behaving. For the most part.

Jesse walked over to the garden, a cute little thing surrounded by a miniature fence and covered by a wide chicken wire dome roof to keep the local wildlife out. It was big enough for Bastion to go about her plots in the little tracks she had set up between them, but she wasn’t fussing over the citrus saplings or the pots of herbs at the moment. On one of her shoulders was Ganymede in her nest and on the other sat Genji, newly released from the medbay with whatever virus had been keeping him back worked out of his system by Torbjörn’s and Angela’s combined efforts. Hanzo stood with a hip pressed against one of the fence posts, his face sporting its usual resting frown, but looking content nonetheless. Lúcio and Lena were outfitted in makeshift padding, wielding hockey sticks and hitting a puck with Lúcio’s smiling frog icon at its center.

And they were singing, or at least Lúcio was. Rapping would be a more adequate descriptor, with Genji shouting to join in every other line. Bastion was providing rhythmic beeps in the background, and Zenyatta supplied the bass beat.

“Playin’ Buenos Aires while they sleepin’,” Lúcio twirled on the spot, dodging Lena’s move for the puck and slamming it across from them. _“Buenas noches!”_ [2]

Jesse watched as the puck sailed away, and saw that Hanzo’s scarf had been repurposed into Lena’s goal tied across two posts. Genji’s was similarly used, only his was held on one side by Zenyatta with the other end tied messily to the tailgate of the truck.

The music star laughed triumphant when Zenyatta awarded him a point. “Wonder if I wrote this! ‘Cause it’s so crisp!”

Jesse wandered around inside the perimeter of the fence to come up behind Hanzo and drop his chin on his bare shoulder. Genji started chanting “I got the juice! Juice! Juice!” in tempo with Ganymede’s trilling.

“Hey archer,” he greeted, and Hanzo hummed his acknowledgement. “What’re y’all doin’ out here?”

“Ah.” Hanzo tipped his head slightly so the side of it flattened his hat. “I believe Lúcio called it a ‘jam session’?”

“Yo Woody!” Lúcio’s voice snapped his attention over to him after he managed to land another goal. He sang at him, “How’s it feel to be you? _Yo no se!_ I ain’t really been myself since-” [3]

Jesse tipped his hat and gave him a bemused smile, not really sure of what he was saying.

“You’re a genius! A motherfuckin’ pop smash!” Genji crowed, swaying in his perch atop the omnic.

Lúcio laughed, raised an arm, and bobbed in place, “Hit sensei, master-!”

“I’m not crazy, right?” Jesse said just loudly enough to be heard over the racquet. “All this noise is them singin’ somethin’ ‘bout juice?”

Everyone except Bastion, who seemed really invested in her beeps, quieted ominously.

“Noise?” Hanzo twisted and dislodged him. Jesse gulped at his tone.

“Uh...” he said intelligently. Lena gave him a wide-eyed look of pity, but took advantage of Lúcio’s open-mouthed expression to steal the puck and tear down the field. He turned to mouth a plea at Genji, but the cyborg just shook his head slowly at him.

“Brother, you must have patience. McCree was born in a barn.”

“Was not.” He rebutted irritably, but then Hanzo’s eyes narrowed and Jesse pasted on his most beguiling smile. Hanzo took a step away and turned to face him.

“Hmm. A pity. It would have fit your persona. At the very least it would have provided a plausible excuse for the absurdity of your getup. But then I suppose anyone with a six-shooter and a penchant for listening to truck music would have lost the ability to discern even the basest of gratifying sounds.”

“Now don’t be like that, sweetheart, I can hear plenty fine.” McCree leaned down and brought a hand up to cup Hanzo’s jaw and tilt his face up. “Why, how can I take offence when just the sound of your voice is like music to my ears?”

Then Zenyatta piped up, “Music it may be to ears such as yours, McCree, but do not feign to assume we all hold it in the same regard.” Jesse tried not to laugh at the glare Hanzo swiveled to direct straight at the monk. When he didn’t quite manage it, he ended up having the glare aimed at him instead.

“Caught your interest long enough to stop ‘n’ listen though, didn’t it?” He called out, and Zenyatta chuckled in good nature.

“Do not encourage this.” Hanzo growled.

“I ain’t encouragin’ nothin’, darlin’.” He backed away a couple of steps, just to be safe. “Anyway. Came to find ya. Mei wants you down in the labs, she’s got our new duds for the mission. Figured we could go down together.”

Hanzo excused himself from the group and together they made their way down to the labs, solemnly discussing the situation in Mexico and the news they had received that morning from Geneva about a blip in the schedule to open the Watchpoint in Hanamura. They lightened up once they walked into the lab and were directed past a screen by Winston to find Mei bullying Jamison into a pair of heavy-looking work pants.

“What’s wrong with my shorts?” Jamison grumbled, then jumped when Mei reached out to pinch together the back of his industrial orange jacket with a safety pin. Mako stood to the side in similar get-up, with a welding mask over his face.

“Your leg is a pretty defining factor to your infamy, Mr. Fawkes.” she answered.

Satya was already dressed in a flowered skirt and lace top with a shawl that covered her arm. Hanzo got fitted in a pair of faded ripped jeans and a dark t-shirt with some obscure band name on it, topped by a leather jacket, some sunglasses, and an order to keep his hair down. His guitar case for Storm Bow was propped against her desk. Fareeha’s outfit, which sat draped over a chair was nearly identical save for the flannel shirt that replaced the jacket and a baseball cap. Angela had already dropped by to pick up her sundress and pack it away.

But for McCree, Mei had an ultimatum.

“Mexico is the one place where your everyday wardrobe would not raise too many eyebrows.” she explained, then she reached into a little bag and pulled out an electric razor. “But your bounty has not been lifted, and we need to make sure that no one recognizes you while the team is out during recon.” Jesse stared at her in horror, and Satya came up behind her with a hat stand she had created just for the occasion.  

“I ain’t doin’ it.”

“You have to.” Mei smiled at him.

Jesse grimaced. “Can’t I just, I dunno… wear one of ‘em Hawaiian shirts with some khakis, slap on my hat and call it a day?”

Across from them, Hanzo made a pained noise with a face that looked like he sucked on a lemon.

Mei turned on the razor. “The beard or the hat, McCree.”  

“Can’t y’just take m’belt?” he whimpered. Mei grinned.

“Oh, I’m taking the belt.”

* * *

 

In the end all he got was a trim to both his beard and hair, but now he had a new pair of jeans and a red plaid shirt. His hat, chaps, belt buckle, chestplate, spurs, and sarape were stuffed in the duffel bag currently at his feet. He leaned over in his seat to dig the sarape out to combat the cold Fareeha insisted was a comfortable temperature.

The transport lights were dimmed down, the only bright light came from Satya and the little hard light geometric prisms she was creating for Hanzo’s amusement. Angela’s back was pressed against Jesse’s side. She was typing away at her tablet, taking advantage of the quiet that came when Jamison passed out draped over Mako’s lap an hour before. Jesse tipped his head and let it rest on her blonde head. He yawned and grumbled about the transport’s damn air vents.

“Blowin’ cold enough to freeze yer damn nips off.” he said, just loud enough to carry to where the half-undressed archer could hear him. Hanzo, who had been given the option to change into his civilian clothes once they landed, ignored him.

“Go to sleep, Jesse.” Angela scolded lightly. Jesse clicked his tongue at her mothering tone and shifted a shoulder, displacing her. She clucked at him and bullied him into a more comfortable position then went right back to using him as a couch.

“If you’re not going to sleep, you can coach me on my Spanish. I need to be prepared to communicate with civilians should our task end in violence. What is ‘help me’?”

Jesse couldn’t stifle another yawn. He readjusted his sarape so that it hung over Angela’s thin shoulders too, and answered, _“Ayudame.”_

He felt the motion of her nod. “‘Where does it hurt’?”

_“Donde te duele?”_

She repeated the phrase back to him. They ran through common phrases related to her line of work, and after an hour he ran her through sets of vocabulary drills.

_“Dolor?”_ he asked.

“Pain.” Angie answered drowsily. He hummed.

_“Sangre?”_

“Blood.”  

_“Herida?”_

“Wou-” she heaved a great yawn, and leaned back to nuzzle further into the warmth he and his sarape offered. “Wound.”

“Three out of three! You did alright, Angie.”

She let out a sleepy little, “Yay,” and let her head fall back onto his shoulder. Jesse kept still and let her sleep.

Across from them, Satya stood up. She handed Hanzo a glittering octahedron the size of the palm of her hand, then she headed off in the direction of the cockpit. Presumably to keep Fareeha company, or maybe to try and flirt with her. He’d have to urge Angie to get more of a move on when they landed. Take Faree out on a date- maybe go dancing the night of the festival that they’d be just in time to catch before their mission the following morning.

Or maybe he could just do all that stuff himself and bring along one taciturn archer.

Said archer was sitting primly in his seat, turning the sparkling prism over in his hand. The weight of his gaze must have caught his attention, because he looked up. Jesse nodded, and Hanzo quirked an eyebrow. Jesse parted his lips and mouthed, _‘C’mere.’_

Hanzo went.

“Spanish sounds… soothing. Almost lyrical.” he opened with, settling in on his left. Jesse carefully raised his arm to untuck the sarape from around himself and offer the end to Hanzo. He took it, and leaned in closer to share. “Would you teach me as well?”

Jesse reveled in the feeling of being pressed in between two of his favorite people, one big comfy sandwich. “You goin’ for trilingual there, Shimada-san?”

Hanzo made a thoughtful noise, then exhaled softly and answered, “No. I think the correct term for it would be polyglot? I speak Korean as well as English.”

“Well hot damn,” he gave the lowest whistle possible so as to not disturb Angela. “Ain’t you a clever fella?”

“Mmm. Cease your flattery and make yourself useful, cowboy. I heard everything you taught Dr. Ziegler. Teach me.”

McCree turned his head and prompted him to translate a few of the words he had just given Mercy. _“Ayudame?”_

“Help me.” Hanzo answered seamlessly.

_“Dolor?”_

“Pain.”

“Alright. Movin’ on then. Introductions.”

Jesse didn’t pride himself in being the best teacher, but he was determined where Hanzo was stubborn, and the lesson moved as fast as Hanzo advanced. Satya came back around the time Hanzo finally managed to roll his r’s, and she looked at them curiously. Jesse offered an invitation, but she turned him down and went to pull down a cot to sleep instead. Hanzo had taken out his handheld and began to type notes, and Jesse offered corrections on his spelling before Athena’s interface could check and offer them herself. He laughed when Hanzo complained about the double ‘l’ in _‘llamas’_ and nearly choked trying to cut it short for Angie’s sake.

“So instead of honorifics, you simply use _keigo?”_ [4] Hanzo fixed his spelling and shot him another question. Jesse squirmed. The part of his arm that wasn’t mechanical was suffering pins and needles, but he didn’t want to move and ruin the peace.

“Well naw, not really. I mean yeah, we use formal and casual speech dependin’ on the situation, but nothin’ like your… what’s it that y’all add to last names? _-San, -kun, -chan?_ Oh. Wait.” He paused, and Hanzo glanced up to show he was listening. “Technically I guess we do. Older folks get _señor y señora._ Young women are _señorita.”_

“And children?” he prompted. Jesse gave in to the dead feeling in his arm to bring his hand up to scratch at his beard, hissing in displeasure at the jolt that ran through it. Hanzo shifted too, and settled against the transport’s wall.

“Children… they get nicknames, for the most part. Most common one’s just to take a name and mash it with _‘-ito_ ’ at the end if it’s a boy, or _‘-ita’_ if it’s a girl.” Hanzo made a confused noise, so Jesse went on. “Just whatever sounds cute. Like,-” He ignored the sound of Reyes’ voice in his head and said, “-take me for example. Jesse, so it’s Jessito. Angie here’d be Angelita. Fareeha… hmm… naw. Faree’d stay Faree.”

“Genji?” Hanzo asked, laughter in his voice.

“Genjito.” They both chuckled at the absurdity of it. “You though, you’ve got a good name for it. Hanzito.”  

Hanzo scoffed, Jesse smiled, and they fell silent.

Soon enough, Satya’s soft even breathing joined the chorus of those resting on the quiet transport. Even Roadhog seemed to be asleep, not that anyone could really tell with the mask. Jesse was just on the edge of passing out himself, when Hanzo’s low voice roused him.

“What is ‘sun’?” he asked. Jesse blinked away the siren call of dreams.

_“Sol.”_ he answered.

Hanzo sighed and pressed closer against him. “How do you say ‘warmth’?”

_“Calidez.”_

“‘You are?’”

Jesse waited for an end to the sentence, but translated when it became apparent none was forthcoming. _“Tu eres.”_

Hanzo tipped his head up. He waited until the feel of his breath against the side of his neck drew Jesse to look down at him. The archer’s eyes were heavy in the darkness, weighed by the hour and the strange, ethereal moment.

Then he whispered, “How do you say ‘kiss me’?”

Jesse leaned in to press the answer to his lips.

* * *

 

There was a nest of pigeons hidden away in a corner below the shingled awning that kept the rain from splattering against the window McCree stared out of. At the front of the pristine meeting room stood a LumériCo official, giving them the rundown of their escort mission the next day. Her assistant pulled up images on the holo that curved around the perimeter of the room, outlining the ziggurat’s fusion core configuration. Satya sat at the front row and took fervent notes while Angela eyed the Junkers with unease as Jamison took notes with equal enthusiasm.

Jesse listened intently even as he craned his neck to look below where a girl and her mother were carrying folding tables from their house to the big tents set up along the edge of the streets. The Saturday before the Day of the Dead, or more colloquially, _el festival de la luz_. [5] Already lanterns were being set up and ropes of Christmas lights hung from roofs and balconies.

The pigeons cooed, and the scent of the sun shower crept in past the shuttered windows of LumériCo’s resource building. Jesse looked back to their presenter.

“Our main concern,” she said with a flick of her wrist to activate translation on a new set of slides, “Is that we expect Los Muertos will attempt to intervene as they did during our previous opening ceremony.”

“So far, all Muertos movement in this sector has had little to do with us personally. They’re on the brink of engaging in a turf war with a gang out of Jalisco to retain their smuggling routes under the excuse of ‘keeping our streets safe’.” The assistant made a disgusted noise and went on, “But seeing as their meddling set us back an entire year...”

“And revealed the corruption of your former CEO…” Fareeha breathed next to him, and Jesse nodded. She nodded back.

“As we try to transition from photovoltaics to our new system, we have managed to bring online all but one of our ziggurats. The pyramids.” Their presenter explained. “But there has been activity recently on the edge of town. Los Muertos members found incapacitated with weapons stashes too close to our delivery route to be a coincidence. This has happened before. Locals claim to have seen some vigilante, dubbed by the people as _el soldado_ around Los Muertos hotspots. He has not done anything… illegal, other than carry around unregistered weaponry but…” she gave a dry laugh, “That’s not exactly uncommon here.”

Jamison shot Mako a toothy grin, and got a grunt in return. The assistant looked one twitch away from pulling out their phone and calling the police.

“LumériCo is not a private company. We rely on the government to see us to our opening day, and they have decided to call upon you, Overwatch. We cannot tell you how to do your jobs, but we can tell you this: The people of Dorado are scared. They do not have the means to communicate as effectively with the world to call for aid and share our story. They deserve the change LumériCo can offer. With stable internet connection and an infallible power source, Dorado could begin a long awaited golden era. We have a bad past, but we are under new leadership, and all LumériCo has ever truly wanted was to help.”

And with that, and a few more files of recent Muertos activity as sighted by local law enforcement, they were dismissed. LumériCo set them up with a dormitory room meant for their round-the-clock maintenance workers, and they all squeezed in there to plan.

Satya pulled up a holo, and then Winston’s face joined them. Half of them crammed onto one bed, Satya and Hanzo claimed another. Jamison sat cross-legged next to Jesse while Mako went and pulled apart two of the bunks, then arranged them so that three beds were pressed together in the corner.

“Los Muertos have been known to use explosives to distract from their attacks.” Winston said. “Figuring out where they’re going to be can help us better manage crowd control and alert the authorities to set a perimeter in good time.”

“We can do it!” Jamison offered. They all turned to look at him. He went on, “Not many hidey-holes ‘round the main roads the truck’ll be takin’. Think we took all the good ‘un’s when we… uh… when we…” He trailed off at the severe look Fareeha directed at him. “Look mate, we all know who we are. Ain’t wearin’ them dumb costumes for funsies, ey?”

“Speaking of which,” Winston cut in before Fareeha could go on one of the lawful scoldings she usually saved for Jesse, “You don’t have much daylight left. Get changed and gather information while you can. And McCree?”

They all stood up to do as ordered, and Jesse paused with his arm outstretched towards his duffel. “Yeah?”

“Mei told me to tell you, ‘Don’t you do it!’ and ‘Hanzo has the razor!’.” Winston read off a sticky note with squinting eyes. Jesse turned to face the archer with a look of utter betrayal.

Hanzo simply raised his eyebrows at him, then pulled his _gi_ off and tugged the t-shirt on. McCree grumbled, but when he brought his hand out of the duffel, all he had was a jacket.

They left in pairs, each going their own way. Some to the streets, others to the ziggurat. As the lead, Jesse got stuck in the LumériCo building as the information hub and to keep track of Athena’s drones.

Satya and Fareeha reported from the ziggurat, quelling Winston’s fears that there was still something rotten in Denmark. “Everything is as has been reported.” Satya said, and Winston sighed in relief.

“They seem to have truly turned a new leaf.” Athena said, as their eyes in the sky. “I think we are safe from scandal.”

“If the creek don’t rise...” Jesse chewed on the end of his unlit cigarillo, eyeing the ‘no smoking’ sign resentfully. He watched the Junkers’ dots on his map and warned them to stay away from the bank. Mako gave an affirmative, but Jamie prattled on about their heist and how they pulled it off, all the while trying to weasel tips and tricks out of him.

“Lucky for us, Mister Soldier Guy wasn’t around when we went and did it.” said Jamison. “76, or whatever they’re callin’ ‘im. But if he had been, how would you’da done it? Didn’t that lady from the news say he’s your old boss?”

Jesse snorted, “Yeah, with all the credibility of an LA tabloid. Naw, whoever this fella is, I don’t think he’d give two cents ‘bout what the likes of you’d be doin’. Y’all don’t get anyone killed.”

Winston implored they stay on topic and refrain from airing their criminal records on an official line. Hanzo and Angela’s dots walked around the seashore shops, stopping and chatting with store owners that were accustomed to tourists and their many questions. They relayed that there were to be festivities all around the city come sundown, but they were warned by a kindhearted old woman to stick to the plazas by the seashore and hotels, as they were more often frequented by police patrols. Los Muertos were known to shadow tourists, and many unassuming rich folk ended up kidnapped and held for ransom when they ventured deeper into the city in search of a ‘more genuine experience’.

“This has little to do with our mission tomorrow, but such information could be used towards your quest for the hacker.” Hanzo said.

“Alright. Who’s up for a ‘more genuine experience’, then?” Agent McCree asked the group.

They all met up by a bakery and walked together up a cobblestone path admiring the candles and strings of light decorating the square. Jesse complained that Mako’s huge Hawaiian shirt should have been his and couldn’t see if he got a reaction, seeing as the man wore a floral handkerchief over the lower portion of his face with sunglasses over his eyes. Jamison was in matching clothes, all except for the mask. With his hair combed back and not lit, he almost looked like an average person. An average person whose hidden prosthetic let him shoot three feet into the air when he caught sight of the various food carts lining the edge of a far building.  

“Mango! On a stick? I want two! Roadie, how many d’you want?”

They split up, Winston and Athena’s voices in their ears giving them police reports in case they got an earlier sighting. Jesse bought a mangonada for Hanzo and ended up eating most of it himself when the archer pulled a face at it. Satya sidled up to them irritably to eat her roasted corn when Angela pulled Fareeha away quietly to the other side of the center fountain.

The little plaza was thrumming with life. A band played around the burbling fountain with children running around and under the legs of the dancers that dipped and swung on the cleared pavement circle. Folding chairs were pushed against walls, but the locals took a seat on everything from overturned buckets to the fountain edge, some even going as far as climbing onto window ledges.

Jesse claimed them a spot on a little set of stairs and let Hanzo and Satya sit. They settled down, Hanzo propped his guitar case against the wall and hid her big purse right behind it. Jesse preferred to stand against the railing. It gave him a better vantage point, but Hanzo was quick to point out it would just as easily get him recognized.

But the cowboy had the advantage of blending in with his surroundings. He watched the scene around them for any sign of phosphorescent paint besides the graffiti already scrawled on brick walls. Angela waited in line at a food vendor stall, and Fareeha stood guard at a nearby bench, her eyes a little too sharp to look completely casual. Next to him, Hanzo and Satya had their heads ducked together, the glossy sheen of their black hair almost melding in their proximity.  

Jesse watched with interest as Hanzo’s and Satya’s conversation was derailed by a bold woman that pushed her way past a couple of lovebirds blocking the way. Impressive, given she was only a little over five feet tall. She pulled to a stop in front of the trio and regarded Hanzo coolly. Hanzo stared back in disinterest. The girl just grinned wider, then turned to Satya and offered her hand.  

_“Hola linda. Bailas?”_ [6]

Hanzo turned to Jesse immediately, but Satya was staring at the girl with a hard, calculating look. The other’s smile didn’t falter, teeth glimmering between bright purple lipstick.

“She’s askin’ if you wanna dance.” He translated dutifully. Her hand was still held out to Satya. The bright pink polish of her nails disappeared when the architech slid her hand over hers. She lifted her off the steps and they walked off without another word. Jesse didn’t think much of it, but Hanzo looked more than a bit surprised.

“Do you?” Jesse said to Hanzo. The latter looked away from where Satya was hesitantly putting her hands on her partner’s hip and arm.

“Do I what?”

“Wanna dance?” He nodded at the couples laughing together on the dance floor and crooked a hopeful smile.

Hanzo immediately took on a look of anxiety, though he quashed it and answered in a hesitant tone. “I’ve taken part in traditional Japanese ceremonial dances, not this…” he gestured, lost. “What is this?”

“Cumbia.” Jesse watched, fascinated by how quickly Satya got the hang of it. Her loose hair swung behind her in flashes as she twirled, her partner not missing a step. Their hands together then apart, quick steps and hips swaying as the girl spoke to her with a pleased smile. Hanzo’s expression could almost be one of jealousy at her prowess.

Either that or the mango was making him sick.

“I… no. No, I do not...” He looked to Jesse thoughtfully, somewhat guiltily. “I would not hold it against you if you were to find yourself a more suitable partner. I can keep watch if you wish to… partake in the festivities for some time.”  

Jesse exhaled lightly, then brought his hand to rub his beard just as the band started on the next song. “Naw, this’s as fine as-”

_“Suavemente besame-”_

Jesse perked up as a new mass of people flooded to the space surrounding the fountain where the band was gearing them up for a classic merengue.

“Angie!” he yelled out to the pair a ways across from them, catching her attention. She turned to him, eyes just as wide and glittering as his, mouth splitting in a gorgeous smile as she took in the sounds quickly filling the plaza.

Urgently, he turned to Hanzo and asked, “Sure you don’t mind?” But Hanzo was already pushing him off, and Jesse kept his eyes on Angie as she moved towards him.

_“Que quiero sentir tus labios besandome otra vez, suave-”_

In that moment, Angela could have been all of twenty-two, in a blue dress borrowed from Ana on the night of her promotion, the night that would set her on the fast track to putting her at the helm of her hospital in Switzerland, making her breakthroughs in nanobiology. Jack had toasted to her, to her promise, the promise of everyone gathered in that ballroom. That they would change the world for the better.

And him, the same age, young and more than a bit foolish. Content and at home where he stood, surrounded by people who believed in his ability to make a difference, quiet though it was. The deep notes of a piano offset by a sudden change of pace, the blow of trumpets.

In his mind, Jack and Angela faltered in the middle of their waltz. Ana laughed for the first time since Fareeha decided she was grown up enough to join the military. She called out for Gabriel to turn it up and pushed Jesse onto the floor with a wink to, _‘let Gabe have his partner, pardner.’_

“Jesse!” Angela called back, rushing at him with her hand stretched out. Suddenly Geneva was gone, and the vibrant sights and sounds of Mexico came rushing back. He ran to her. “Do you remember-” she gasped when they crashed together.

“Like in the banquet!” He finished, but paused and looked back to where she had abandoned Fareeha. “But don’t you wanna…?”

Angela shook her head, not bothering to hide her disappointment. “I asked. She… she said she doesn’t want to in front of so many people. How about you?” She nodded at Hanzo behind him.  

_“-besame besame suave-”_

His face mirrored hers on that particular bummer. “Same story.”  

“Well then,” she said, and led them into the throng.

_“-besame otra vez-”_

Step forward, forward, side, then back, parallel with Angie next to him, her up-do already coming loose from its sophisticated knot as he led her through the first series of spins. Laughing, they went hip to hip, elbows knocking together in the packed crowd, arms going up after another twirl.

He took her hand and pulled her close, grinning like a loon as he felt her laughter against his chest with his hand at the small of her back. They pulled apart, then back together, and he dipped her, causing another breathless fit of giggles. Then hip to hip again, arms around the others’ shoulders and opposite hands clasped in front.  

_“-suavemente. Ese coro! Besame! Es la cosa! Que quiero sentir tus labios-”_

They got their arms tangled trying to spin at the same time, but Angie saved them by moving off and around him, letting him laugh while he stepped in time at the center of her orbit.

He caught Hanzo abandoning his weapon to move over to Fareeha’s seat out of the corner of his eye, but lost sight when Angela pulled at him again.

“I am _not_ …” he panted, grinning from ear to ear, “As young as I used to be.”

“I told you to stop smoking.” Angela said, not even looking winded as the end drew near. He moved behind her, stepping from one side to the other, guiding them. He raised an eyebrow with interest when he saw Fareeha stand up and point at them while yelling something down at an unruffled Hanzo. Angela led them through the final length of footwork, remarking how miraculous it was neither had stepped on the other despite their lack of practice. McCree stiffened when he felt someone barreling towards them from behind just as the final words of the song rang.

_“-besame, pequeña, cógelo!”_ [7]

“I- ah. Uh… Angela?” Came an obviously nerve-wracked voice from behind him. Jesse softened, gave Angela one last spin and they both turned to face the speaker.

Fareeha stood painfully straight, fussing with a loose string on the hem of her flannel shirt. Even in the low soft light of the plaza, her dark skin was obviously flushed.

“I- that is, I- um, can I-?” She gestured weakly with her hand and looked up only to flush further and look back down. Jesse glanced down at Angela, pink and pretty from the exertion of the dance and the joy that was no doubt bubbling up at Fareeha’s stammering proposal. “W-would you save the next dance for me?” Fareeha finally managed to get out in a quick rush of breath.

As if on cue, the swirling sound of trumpets reached their end and quiet momentarily filled the square. Then began the soft sound of woodwinds and the curt chords of a guitar. Angela offered her hand, and Fareeha breathed a sigh of relief and reached out to take it. They walked away, and Jesse allowed himself a few moments to watch them gain their bearings before he moved to return to the sidelines.   

At his shoulder sounded a pointed cough. _“Disculpa.”_ said a new accented voice. [8] Jesse looked down just in time to see Hanzo hide the smile that he wore as the two women began to dance. “I see your partner has abandoned you in favor of one less fair.”

Jesse laughed, “Less fair, eh? Lie that it is, I ain’t about to turn down a line like that.” He nodded over to where Angie was taking initiative, showing the taller woman where to step and how to pivot. “That your doing?”

_“Bailame despacio, no mires el reloj, no quiero que la noche acabe-”_ The first lines of the new song were almost sighed and lost in the hustle of the crowd.

“Yes.” Hanzo answered.

“Hit by cupid’s arrow.” he mused, watching Fareeha get over her nerves to frame Angie’s waist with her hands. “Didn’t pin you for that particular brand of archer, archer.” His feet moved to carry him directly in front of Hanzo, who was looking at the other dancers with a watchful eye- either doing his job or trying to learn steps at the last minute. “Thought this wasn’t your cup of tea.”

“It is not,” Hanzo said, looking up to freeze him with his sharp look. Jesse got caught in that gaze. “But I am willing to learn.”   

_“-y aun no me atrevo. Dame una señal para perder el miedo-”_

He raised a tentative hand to Hanzo’s shoulder, and the archer stepped closer.  

“Teach me.” he ordered in his commanding tone, but there was hesitation and insecurity in his eyes. Jesse took his left hand in his right, the dark of his skin contrasting with Hanzo’s in the soft yellow light shining down from the rope of bulbs overhead.

“Well for one,” he pushed until they were pressed flush together, “Loosen up a lil’, darlin’. This ain’t so much footwork as it is movin’ yer hips.”

“Moving my…?” he cut off with a little gasp when Jesse made to teach by example. “You-!”

“Shhh!” Jesse laughed and dipped his head to press their foreheads together. “Put your right hand here, just above my belt.” He draped his own arm over his shoulder. “Feel how I move.”

Hanzo did just that, and Jesse went on to whisper instructions above his ear. “Weight on your left, step back with your right. Just a lil’, that’s it. Step in place with your left. Now right foot back in start position and put your weight on it. Now step back with your left and- yeah!”

He took a step forward, and Hanzo took one back. He led them through it a few times until Hanzo stopped glaring down at their feet with a constipated expression and looked up smiling almost bashfully instead. He clasped their right hands in between them and beamed with pride.

“Side-side step. Then,” He pulled back, their outstretched arms the only link between them. “Keep your arm like that, you’re gonna twirl me, and-” he turned quickly until he felt Hanzo’s hand press to the back of his neck, then spun back around. “-Now you!”

The sight of Hanzo’s dark hair whirling in the air as he twisted back into his arms on the brink of laughter made his chest ache unexpectedly.

_“-muero por tenerte siempre conmigo. No quiero perderte, estoy convencido-”_

He was unable to keep back the indulgent chuckle that came out when Hanzo finally got the hang of it and started taking the lead. After a few missteps and prodded toes, he slowed them back down, following the music’s cues to clasp their opposing hands and pull him close again. Together they swayed, and Jesse flashed Fareeha a thumbs up using the hand he had on Hanzo’s shoulder.

“How are they doing?” Hanzo asked, not tall enough to see past the crowd to where Angela and Fareeha were dancing slow and sweet just out of reach of the fountain’s splash.

“Reckon the base’ll have somethin’ else to gossip ‘bout ‘round the time we get back.” He stepped back just far enough to be able to kiss the bridge of Hanzo’s nose, and got a gruff noise of half-hearted protest for his trouble.

“And Satya?”

“Can’t have gotten far.” He squinted to see if he could make out her dark curtain of hair or the blue of her shawl, but no luck. No sign of her purple-haired partner either. “Jamie’s sittin’ sharin’ churros with Mako, but no architech. Wanna call her on the comm?”

Hanzo shook his head. But in his inspection, McCree spotted something else. Neon green and bright white in the shadow under the shelter of a bridge. The band quieted, a sign the song was winding down. He gripped the sleeve of Hanzo’s jacket tighter. Hanzo responded by looking up at him curiously.

“Alright sweetheart now I know I said this ain’t about steppin’,” He lowered his voice to a whisper, “But we’re gonna have to make our way over to the ladies over there ‘cause I think I found someone eyein’ Angie with some ill-intent.”

_“-piensas en mi, como yo en ti. Habla claro no perdamos mas el tiempo.”_ [9]

The two suspicious figures were joined by two others. They seemed to be foolishly eyeing Jamie, who had wandered away from his bodyguard to find a bin for their trash. He saw Roadhog perk up, spotting the danger as more glowing skulls emerged from the shadows.

Jesse stepped away from his dance partner to swipe a beer bottle from a passing drunkard. “Find your architech.” He ordered in a whisper, and Hanzo nodded before vanishing into the crowd.

Finger in his ear, he stumbled over to where Jamie was puzzling over the Spanish labels plastered on dumpsters.

“Mako, I know you see what I’m seein’, and I’m on it. Jamie, I’ma need you to stay right where you are.”  

“Ain’t ‘bout to just chuck ‘em in any ol’ bin and run, mate. Recycling’s important.” Jamison answered. Jesse reached him and threw an arm around his shoulders, exaggerating his movements, dragging his feet. He spoke loudly in Spanish, but slowly, trying to explain the waste disposal system to the clueless tourist as he tossed out the empty bottle.  

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw them fall back to watch. Jesse cheerfully walked Jamie back whilst chattering away. Hanzo and Symmetra called in, and Mercy and Pharah stood next to some benches to await orders.

Under the guise of chatting amicably with a pair of tourists, he relayed the plan to the team on the line.

“I’ve only counted six.” he said, and both Athena and Hanzo confirmed the number. “Nothin’ we can’t handle, but there’s a chance they’ve called the others if they’re expectin’ a nice catch. They’ve been eyein’ you for a while Mercy, so you’re the honeypot. Faree, you’re her darling devoted girlfriend, apparently, so watch her back. Mako, I’m borrowin’ Jamie.” Junkrat gave an enthusiastic thumbs up and Roadhog didn’t react whatsoever. “Now don’t go makin’ that face at me, he’ll come back in as many pieces as he’s got now. The rest of you stay here in case we call for backup.”

“Los Muertos already know we’ve got a team stationed in Dorado. They may be trying to lure you into a trap. Remain vigilant.” Winston said on the comm. They all voiced their understanding. Fareeha and Angela stepped off, pressed together and giggling their way down an empty street. Angela had her peashooter strapped to her thigh beneath her dress and Fareeha was similarly armed.

Meanwhile, Jesse leaned on Jamie as they made their way up a little street curving up a hill, lined by colorful buildings and few lights. Peacekeeper was tucked in the back of his pants, and Jamie was packing explosives on the harness underneath his shirt.  

Jesse gave on-the-fly directions to a nonexistent home, getting deeper and deeper in the maze that was the sleepy streets of Dorado. He turned and led them towards an alley that was the only entry to a small abandoned courtyard and paused just outside of it to take a piss against the wall while Jamie discreetly planted a bomb behind the rock he sat on to wait him out. They moved past their choke point, and Jesse gave Jamison a leg up onto a balcony as he stood just off to the side hiding.

The distant sounds of the party didn’t manage to cover the sound of three pairs of feet storming towards their hiding place once they made it all the way in.

_“Manos al aire!”_ yelled the voice of the gangster at the back. _“No se muevan-!”_ [10]

“Or how about,” Jesse lifted his arm so that Peacekeeper pressed against the chrome and bright pink forehead of the Muerto that had rushed forward without checking the scene first, “You drop that gun o’ yours and we have a nice chat?”

“Ah ah ah!” He heard Junkrat say from the roof, probably threatening the other two behind the first with the detonator in his hand. “Hands outta your pocket, mate. I’d love ta blow you up, but I don’t think you’d enjoy it as much.”   

_“Que saques las manos de tu bolsillo, cabron!”_ translated the omnic leading the crew. [11]

_“Y tu. Ni pienses en alertar a los demas, menos que quieras salir de esto muerto en vez de vivo con las vidas de tus compatriotas en tu consciencia.”_ Jesse pressed the barrel of his gun steady against the omnic’s head to put weight to his threat. [12]

_“Los omnicos no tienen consciencia.”_ growled the one in the back. Jesse’s mark sighed. They turned their head slightly and muttered an exasperated, _“En serio, Pablo? Ahorita tambien vas a salir con tus pendejadas?”_ [13]

“Right, that’s enough of that.” McCree said, and with Junkrat’s help they frogmarched the Muertos into the empty courtyard after taking their weapons. When the third got snippy on the way in, Jesse clubbed him with the butt of his gun and he dropped to the ground, out cold. The omnic actually thanked him quite politely, then turned to watch Junkrat come out from the shadows with a new mine held in hand.

Jesse moved to aim at the second Muerto. The girl in the middle finally spoke up to ask what they were after. Jesse shot off questions regarding the hacker that aided in airing LumériCo’s dirty laundry, and her eyes lit up in recognition.

_“Quién, Sombra? La de los hackeos? Si, hace tiempo fue una Muerta, pero desapareció. Ya no hay contacto entre ella y nosotros, al menos no por el año pasa’o. Si la buscas, y si la encuentras, dale una cachetada por mi, si?”_ [14]

Jesse blinked. _“Y que te hizo para merecer…?”_ [15]

The omnic interrupted him, staring at Jamison intently. _“Oye, que no es este jefe el que hizo el robo del banco de dorado hace un año?”_

The girl blinked. She grinned. _“Tienes razón, cabrón! Si que se parece!”_

The omnic’s eyes flashed and landed on Jesse. _“Y que no este…”_ [16]

“Athena…” Jesse warned their eyes in the sky. “You got a drone nearby?”

_“Es Jesse McCree! Si son los de Overwatch!”_ [17]

“My two drones are currently in pursuit of the Muertos Agents Mercy and Pharah have split up to take down. Are you in need of assistance?”

Jesse was too busy looking up to see five glowing skulls drop down from an adjacent roof, wielding highly illegal, nasty looking guns to give her an answer. He ducked down and side-stepped to avoid the body of the girl that tried to tackle him. He shot her in the back and moved to put a tree between him and the spray of bullets from one of the descending gangsters.

_“’Vivo o muerto’ dicen los letreros!”_ cried the voice of one of their new guests. Jesse shot her between the eyes and jumped behind the cover of a garden statue when Jamison lobbed a grenade in the air.[18]

The explosion startled the pigeons from their nests on the surrounding roofs, and made sure that Jamison regained his most defining trait. In a flurry of feathers and leaves, the omnic he had been questioning made a bid for their weapon tucked in McCree’s pocket, and more footsteps sounded from the little alleyway.

Hair smoking, Junkrat giggled as he activated the bomb he’d planted at the entrance, and the force of the explosion propelled a few charred bodies forward as well as chipped the brick walls.  

Jesse grappled with the omnic on the ground, and managed to kick them off and crawl away, keeping his head down to avoid getting knocked out by the debris that flew from whatever Junkrat was blowing up.

“Agent McCree. Are you in need of assistance?” Athena asked.

The omnic grabbed at his ankles and yanked him back, and Jesse nearly lost his grip on Peacekeeper. He felt a shotgun get pulled from his pocket just as he twisted to aim back at his opponent.

They both froze, eyeing down the muzzle of each other’s guns.  

Omnics weren’t much harder to read than humans.

“Told you not to call the others.” he said just before fanning the hammer and emptying his bullets in their chest. When the heavy body fell dead on top of his legs, he kicked it aside.

“We’ve got, hmm… ‘Bout seven more incoming.” Junkrat had made it up the roof again, and Jesse scrambled up to survey the mess of bodies in the destroyed courtyard. He sighed and reached up to tilt back his hat, then sighed again when he remembered he didn’t have it.

“Hey Athena, how’re the girls doin’?” he asked as he reloaded.

“Both Agents Mercy and Pharah have captured their marks and are taking them into custody for further questioning.”

Jesse winced and spun the cylinder before tucking the gun back in his pants. He clambered onto the roof with Junkrat and suggested they get a move on judging by the sound of sirens in the distance.

They dropped to the ground a few streets away and turned the corner into yet another dark alley. Another turn, and they ran right into two big muscled men carrying a large crate of flower arrangements between them. Two big muscled men with glowing skulls painted on their faces that immediately ducked down behind the crate and pulled out _a machine gun._

“Oh fuck.” Jesse said with feeling, knowing they had no cover even as he pulled out his gun and yanked Jamie down on the ground with him to avoid the initial attack.   

“Oh fuck me.” Jamie added as he let himself be manhandled into a crouch behind the cowboy.

Then came the sound of rapid fire that came from beams instead of bullets, and the high whine of a charging shot.

With an ear-numbing blast, the crate the Muertos used as cover fell to pieces. Jesse lifted his arm and took aim and shot them both in the head amidst the falling petals of orange marigolds. Jamison was already up and hopping atop dumpsters to reach the place where their savior’s fire had come from. Trusting Jamison, Jesse instead went over to the bodies to make sure they weren’t breathing.

“So. Overwatch really has come to save Dorado.” said a cynical voice that probably went through a whole box of smokes per day. “Can’t do much saving if you’re dead, boy.”

Jesse looked up, kneeling at the feet of the men he killed, arm going up to aim just in case. Jamison had fallen back on a crouch, gazing up at the tall silhouette of a man against the bright nearly full moon.

He was reminded of Genji when he saw a glint of red at the stranger’s eyes.

When he dropped down to the top of the dumpster Junkrat was currently occupying, Jesse could see that the red came from the odd visor he had over his eyes. The number six he just managed to spot on the back of his jacket was enough to put a name to the mystery man. With the visor and a mask hiding the lower part of his face, all Jesse could see was pale skin, with a scar just between his brows, and thinning white hair. The Soldier inspected Junkrat, and snorted at whatever he found before flipping the safety on his huge pulse rifle and settling it over his shoulder.

“A criminal.” He nodded at Jamie. “Did you recruit this one?”

Jesse frowned at the gravelly voice that seemed to be insulting him without actually offering an insult. He lowered Peacekeeper, seeing as the man hadn’t made any threat towards them. “Mighty kind o’ you to step in like that for us, pardner. But I hear you like to keep to the shadows, and you just proved you know who we work for. What’s a vigilante doin’ searchin’ out Overwatch? You lookin’ to join?”

The Soldier snorted and hefted his gun so its weight was on his arms instead. Jesse tensed and subtly reaffirmed his grip on his revolver. Junkrat was wide-eyed as he took in the cut of the man’s jacket and the decal on the back. He was also eyeing the visor with far too much interest, not that it seemed to bother the… really old man, judging on the hairline.

“No, I’m not looking to join. I’ve been waiting for an opportunity to tell you to back off.”

“Back off?”

“Yes. Leave Mexico, Overwatch. Whoever’s in charge this mission didn’t do their homework. Overwatch helps people. This isn’t helping.”

“Sure we are! Gonna get some power in this grid!” Jamison grinned, but quailed when the Soldier turned to look at him again.  

The masked man’s strange gaze fixed on him next, and Jesse tilted his head back and ignored a nagging spark of memory at the voice and their positions. “Explain.” He demanded.

He shook his head and nodded to the alley they had come through. “This isn’t helping.” He repeated. He hopped down to face off with McCree and Jesse noticed they were about the same height. “Leave. Desperately grasping for public approval by accepting any job offer is going to cost you, and it _will_ cost you here. Don’t be dumb, son. Back off from LumériCo and their mess. Let the Muertos do the one thing they’re good for.”  

Jesse raised his eyebrows. “And who exactly are you to lecture me about what Overwatch should and shouldn’t do? Let the gang take control of the city?” He snorted. “I don’t think so.”

“It doesn’t matter who I am. I’m telling you you need to leave.”

“Nope.” He grinned when he saw the Soldier’s arm twitch. Jamison came up from behind him, so quiet the Soldier didn’t seem to take notice. “Bein’ all vague ain’t exactly convincing me to go lasso up my team and get the hell outta Dodge, gramps. I’m gonna need a lil’ more to go on.”     

The Soldier moved forward suddenly and Jesse took a quick step back, feet nearly slipping on the marigolds underfoot. Jamie snuck up closer.

76 snarled at him, trying for intimidation. “Listen to me! If you don’t-!”

Jamie used his prosthetic to launch himself a few feet forward, stretching out to his full height to reach the Soldier and push the release buttons to pry the mask from his face.

The Soldier reacted quickly, one hand abandoning its grip on his rifle to go up and snatch it back too late.

A thin set of lips, square jaw, crooked nose, and unmistakable blue eyes.

Jesse’s eyes widened, and in a second his gun was up, aimed, and cocked.

“No. You’re dead.” He whispered in disbelief. He gaped, but his arm didn’t falter. The wizened and scarred face of Overwatch’s deceased Strike Commander turned to look at him straight on, mask in hand. “You’re dead.”

The Soldier didn’t offer him a reaction other than to try and push Peacekeeper away, but Jesse pressed it to his chest. “How’re you alive, Morrison?!”

“You’re not supposed to know.” Jack grumbled, the look on his face taking Jesse years back to Geneva and failed missions. It was the same expression that he put on when something didn’t go according to plan. At the memory, Jesse snapped into action. He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t face whatever fucking twist of fate this was alone. He moved to press at his comm.

“Angie, Faree?” He had to fight to keep his voice casual. “Y’all still on the ground?”

“Don’t.” Jack immediately protested, but Jesse silenced him with a warning look and the cold metal of a gun pressed to his chest.

“Yes. At the police station, half a kilometer away from your location according to Athena.” Mercy responded.

“If y’all’re good on your end, I’m requesting ground support. Jus’ you two. Don’t go worryin’ any o’ the others.” While he spoke to the girls, Jamison vibrated in excitement.

“Wait just a tic! Morrison? The news lady was right!” Jamison gave a loud cackle and accidentally tread on the body of a fallen gangster when the force of it made him shuffle back. “Oh, this is grand! You went and faked your death, didn’t you? That thing with the- with the base! The explosion! Saw it all on the news, we did!” He walked right up to the soldier’s face beside Jesse, “Ka-BOOM!”

The Soldier grimaced, and Jesse elbowed him away.  

“Jamison.” Jesse said, voice as strained as his self-control. “Back off.”

“If you’re alive, how ‘bout that other one? I’d like to shake his hand! Fine work, that! Blowin’ the place up without raisin’ any fuss!”

“Jamison!” Jesse snapped, and he finally fell silent. He grumbled and went to search the Muertos for any loot. Jesse let him. He turned back to the Soldier.

Morrison was glaring at him, “Let me go, McCree. Neither of them need to know.”

“Like fuckin’ _hell_ ,” he grabbed him by the collar of his tacky leather jacket and pushed him back against the shadow of a building, “They need to know! They deserve to know, and God knows I ain’t sittin’ through whatever half-assed excuse you have for blowin’ headquarters to high heaven and then not telling us _you survived_ alone _._ You let us mourn, you let the world mourn! And Gabe!” He cut himself off before he did something dumb like cry out of a mix of frustration, grief, and rage. “What happened with Gabe? He’s dead and you let the world place all the blame on him! What the fuck happened, Morrison?!”

“Quiet down! Do you want the entire street to hear you?” Jack growled at him and pushed back, catching Jesse off-guard with the strength he put into it. He never used his super soldier strength against any of them, not before. His hand went up to twist Jesse’s wrist and Peacekeeper clattered to the ground. “You don’t know anything!”

Past his heaving breaths, Jesse heard the sound of a pair of footsteps running towards them. “Yeah, I don’t. So why don’t you do some explainin’, Commander?”

The Soldier didn’t get the chance to run off before Angela and Fareeha turned the corner, weapons held to the side and eyes hard and ready for a fight.

He saw Fareeha take in the scene first while Angela’s first reflex was to look over him and Jamie for any wounds.

“Jesse, what-?” she asked, and then Fareeha’s arm shot out to grip her shoulder. He heard her gasp, and turned to watch Jack grimace when he was recognized.     

He heard one set of footsteps run to them haltingly. A small hand gripped his forearm and Angela stuttered as she reached out to Jack with her other hand.

Her mouth hung open, lower lip quivering as her voice struggled to come out.

“I… J-Jack? How?”

The Soldier’s shoulders slumped in what was maybe defeat. He sighed. With a heavy voice he muttered, “Hello, Angela.”

She gave out a shaky laugh that was quickly followed by her grey eyes filling with tears. Her hand remained outstretched, almost afraid to touch the man in fear he would disappear.

More footsteps. Fareeha made her way towards them with a gait more certain than Angela’s. She stopped at the medic’s other side and wrapped an arm around her shoulders while the blonde quickly fell to tears. Fareeha watched Jack with her sharp eyes, looking over the aged face of the man she had grown up knowing.

The Soldier turned to Fareeha, expression shuttered, and gave her a once-over. He made a thoughtful noise, a little hum followed up by, “You look so much like your mother.”

Fareeha’s stoic facade cracked, and she choked out a sob. Jesse reared, left arm pulling back and mechanisms whirring quietly as his hand clenched into a fist.

“Jesse, don’t!” Angela cried too late.  

“You fuckin’ prick!” He spat at the ground where the Soldier landed, hand going up to cup the side of his jaw where Jesse’s metal fist had landed the punch. He spit out a glob of blood and a tooth. Jesse snarled, and Angela leaped forward to grab onto his arm before he could take another shot. Fareeha dove down to grab his gun before he could think to take it. “You goddamn asshole, _hijo de una gran puta! No tienes el derecho de hablar de ella cuando tu fuiste el condenado que la abandonó!”_ [19]

_“No hables de lo que no entiendes!”_ [20] He spat back, same terrible accent that Gabe had always teased him for. He scoffed, almost as if knowing who had just crossed Jesse’s mind. Maybe it showed on his face. “Still taking after him, are you?” The Soldier growled. He cocked his head in obvious challenge. This time Fareeha yanked Jesse back by the collar of his jacket. “I would have thought the years would be enough for you to form your own opinions, but no. Seems you’re still just the same stupid kid, vying for his attention and approval. It’s a wonder you’re not wearing Talon’s crest like the rest of his goons.”  

“Jack!” Angela’s voice cut through the din of Jesse’s anger.

“What the fuck are you tryin’ to say?” Jesse let Fareeha pull him back until he was between her and Angela. A glance to the side showed that Angela had stopped crying.

“They took everyone, McCree. Why aren’t you in one of those stupid helmet and crests like the rest of your black ops team?”

“You know I could never ditch the hat,” he said, and Jack looked up to where the top of his head was pointedly bare. Jesse ignored him, and eyed the old strike commander in contemplation. “You know. You know Talon’s using the Blackwatch playbook. How?”

“You don’t?” he shot back, and Jesse paused.

“No. I don’t. And I don’t like not knowing, Morrison.”

“Tough luck, kid.” He bent over to pick up his gun and hefted it in his arms. Then he stopped Jesse from opening his mouth with a raised hand. “I’m not Reyes, Jesse. You’re not going to weasel it out of me. Run back to Gibraltar. Take your team with you. Like I said, guarding that payload isn’t going to help anyone. Stop playing the hero.”     

“We ain’t playin’ at nothing. And you still owe us a goddamned explanation.” He said. Morrison gave a gruff laugh, and turned his back to walk away.

“Wait! Jack! You’re injured!” Angela ran forward and stopped a few paces behind him. “Let us help you. Don’t leave, please. Everyone thinks-”

He only turned his head a fraction, blue eyes trained on their medic. “Jack is dead. Leave Morrison in the ground where you buried him. Leave me, and leave Mexico.”

“Jack, please!” Her voice was shaking with tears again. But he simply walked off. He turned behind a small house, and disappeared completely from their sight.

“Athena!” she cried, shaking fingers pressed to the comm buried under her hair. “Dispatch your drones, we have to-!”

“No.” Jesse said, and Angela froze at his tone. “Let the son of a bitch go. We don’t need ‘im.”

“Jesse, it’s Jack! We can’t just leave him!”

“He wants to work alone. I say let him. Ain’t ever had a use for people in Overwatch that refused to work as a team. We already got a commander. Don’t need another.” He pulled at her wrist gently until she turned to face him. Fareeha was glaring at the spot the Soldier had vacated, expression angry and pained. “If he don’t need us, we don’t need him. You ‘n’ Faree got what we came here for. You did a good job. Let’s head back for the night, I’ll take care of questioning the Muertos in the mornin’.”

Angela didn’t look convinced, but Fareeha gently nudged her along. Already Jesse could see she wasn’t going to let it slide, and he made it a point to keep an eye on her tomorrow in case she made a break for it to investigate after the mission.

“Good show.” Was all Jamie offered when he stood back up from the ledge he had sat on to spectate.

A quick call to Athena confirmed the team was whole, and he ordered the lot of them back to the LumériCo building they’d be shacking up in.  

It wasn’t until they made it to the back door that Fareeha finally broke the silence.

“We have to tell… Reinhardt. Torbjörn. Winston.” She turned to him, and her eyes were tired. So tired. “How?”

“Best do it all in one go.” he answered, and went through the door after Jamie.

By the time they got everyone gathered and the holo call set up, Watchpoint Gibraltar was just seeing its sunrise. Winston greeted them cheerily, but sobered when he saw the expression on his senior agents’ faces.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“You’ll wanna go get everyone else. And I do mean everyone, Commander.” Jesse said.

Those that didn’t know Jack Morrison in life took the news well enough. Lúcio, Zarya, and Zenyatta seemed elated, if a bit confused by the news.

Reinhardt looked shell-shocked, and Torbjörn went from cursing in Swedish to increasingly colorful English. Lena and Genji immediately jumped to ask more questions than any of the three in Dorado had the energy to answer. Mei reacted in much the same way Angela did.

And Winston was silent throughout the whole thing.

At the end, he called for those gathered around him to settle down, and ordered them all to keep quiet about the news for the time being.

“I… need to think about the best way to handle this on a global level. We will have to report this to Geneva, Agent McCree. You, Mercy, and Pharah will probably be called in as witnesses. What happened on that day at headquarters is still unclear, and the UN will no doubt want to find the one man capable of clearing the air.”

“Yessir,” was all Jesse replied. Angela and Fareeha nodded at his side.

Winston signed off and bid they all get some rest, reminding them they still had a duty to perform the next day.

Jesse glanced at the clock and caught it just as the minute hand reached twelve to align with the hour hand. The next day. The Day of the Dead.

He snorted at fate’s gross sense of humor and ignored Hanzo’s concerned looks as he walked past his bunk to go straight to bed.

* * *

 

Fareeha took care of questioning the Muertos they had taken in, citing that one close call with getting taken in for his bounty was quite enough. Satya went with her, and the rest of the team went back up to the meeting room for a last-minute briefing with LumériCo’s reps.

Winston checked in a few hours before they were meant to start escorting the payload, and told them that he, Reinhardt, and Torbjörn were looking to gather as much information on Soldier 76’s movements before they took their discovery to the UN.

“You look… frazzled, McCree. Will you be fine for the mission?”

“I’m good.” Jesse lied through his teeth and plastered on a smile. The same smile he had been giving the team when they began to shoot the senior agents looks of concern and pity.

Winston peered at him from the little screen in his hand suspiciously. “Take it easy, agent. This is a lot to take in. Why don’t you and the rest of your team go grab a quick lunch, enjoy the festival? Maybe the local food will help lift your spirits in preparation for the escort.”  

Lunch was a good idea, given that there was little for the team to do other than jitter with pre-mission energy until their time came. Jesse asked the LumériCo reps for recommendations and got pointed to a restaurant across the street whose third story terrace allowed for a lovely view of the sea and the people milling about singing songs and carrying bouquets of marigolds and plates of _pan dulce_ to altars set up in homes or the cemeteries on the edge of town. They even called ahead for them, and the staff were warned not to be taken aback when a troupe of seven armed individuals in odd costumes waltzed through the doorway. Already they’d had to dodge cameras, as LumériCo was happy to broadcast the caliber of guards they managed to hire.

With no one else to speak Spanish, and the waitress too starry-eyed to remember any English, Jesse rambled out their orders as his teammates pointed and questioned at the menus.

With most of them taken care of, he turned to Hanzo. “What’ll it be, sweetheart?”

The archer looked at him over the top of his menu. He flipped it and pointed at a spicy crab dish, not trusting himself to try to pronounce the name in Spanish.

“You too?” Jesse laughed, “Genji made himself sick on crab once.” He turned to the waitress to finish off their table’s order. _“Si me puede dar ostiones a la diabla. Y para el, el chipachole de jaiba.”_ [21]

They dug in as if they were famished when the food arrived. Jesse was wiping oyster broth off his beard with a napkin and lighting a cigarillo when from far off came a muffled _boom._

He and Fareeha were immediately on their feet, squinting against the sun to see a plume of smoke rise from the south near Mision Dorado.

Their LumériCo rep patched into the comm, and told them that somehow Los Muertos had found the hidden start point of the truck carrying the fusion core. “We’re taking heavy fire, different weapons than we’re accustomed to dealing with! Requesting immediate backup!”

“Aw come on! We didn’t even get to dessert yet!” Jesse complained, already running at Symmetra’s side to scramble down the stairs. The Junkers lumbered after them, but Hanzo took to the roofs while Pharah and Mercy rose to the skies. Symmetra skidded to a stop at the restaurant counter to slap down some money before she exited the swinging doors.

Jamison hotwired an old truck, and it took some convincing to get Satya to climb into the cabin with him while Jesse stood on the bumper with Roadhog in the bed.  

“This is Hanzo. I’ve got a visual on the fight.” His voice came just as the truck got close enough to clearly hear the blaster shots.

“What’d’ve you got, Agent Sweetheart?” Jesse asked. Jamie hit the brakes to take a sharp turn and Jesse nearly lost his hat. Satya yelled road safety rules from inside.

“There are indeed Muertos members attacking the Mision, but what concerns me is the weapons they wield. They are almost identical to the blasters we lifted off the bodies of our attackers at the Watchpoint.”

“Talon is here.” Fareeha confirmed, and Jesse resisted the urge to turn and holler at the sky, because of course.

“Of course they are!” He replied. He jumped off the back when it became apparent Jamison was going to drive right into the fight. He helped catch Satya when she too abandoned ship. “Why wouldn’t they be? Fuckin’ daisies, poppin’ up all o’er the place.” His grumbles faded out as he took cover behind the archway leading into the Mision courtyard and lined up his shots. He ignored the explosion caused by Junkrat ramming the truck right into a barricade set up by the Muertos. He jumped out at the last second.

He and Satya provided enough cover to distract the enemy long enough for Junkrat and Roadhog to peel the dead LumériCo security guard from his seat at the wheel and climb on themselves. Arrows rained down to pierce the skulls of the gangsters that tried to shoot down the exposed Junker in the truck bed checking over the fusion core.

“Say the thing, Mr. McCree, sir! Let ‘er rip!” Junkrat crowed through the comm. Jesse ran back when they got spotted by a pair of enemy omnics. One targeted Satya, yelling about Vishkar and architechs, and Satya cursed when she had to abandon a turret trap half set up.

“Say wuh?” Jesse asked. Satya disappeared into an open doorway and up some stairs. Jesse wove, and the fire meant for him smattered against a lime green LumériCo advertisement on the wall. He returned fire, and a bullet nicked his shoulder before the omnics fell. Civilians were running, screaming while others edged closer stupidly with their phones out taking video. He yelled at them to get inside and lock the doors. Winston assured them the police were on the way to set a perimeter around the route.

“Battle cry, mate! Wot’s it you cowboys say in Texas?”

“I ain’t from Texas.” A shadow passed from above, and Jesse looked up to see Pharah fly past and shoot a rocket at a car that came up, painted full of skulls.

“Heard it in a movie once! The- the one thingy with the church?”

“Jamison.” Roadhog warned him, but Junkrat let out a laugh and slapped the wheel of the truck as he drove up the street towards him, then brandished his flaming weapon at the sky through the rolled down window.

“REMEMBER THE ALAMO!” He yelled and hit the gas, pulling another daring turn beneath an archway, causing the truck to hover higher and smack into the side of the fountain of the plaza. He put it in reverse and drove back to him. Angela landed next to them to heal a gunshot on Roadhog and looked to McCree in trepidation.

His hat was lowered over his face, hidden in darkness except for the brilliant orange of the ember at the end of his cigarillo.

“Kid.” He said, and Junkrat’s eyes widened with the realization that something was very, very wrong. “I’m Mexican.”

He got a nervous chuckle in response, and was saved having to explain when Mako grunted that they had better get a move on. He started to run after the truck, but a cool voice in his ear brought him to a standstill.

“Agent McCree? I have a proposal to make.” Symmetra asked, and Jesse stopped to consider that Fareeha tethered by Mercy was doing enough damage to the new armored truck driving in from a smaller street by herself.

“What’s your position?” he asked, looking around.

“Agent Hanzo and I are on the bridge to your left. Do you see us?” He spotted them and nodded. “Go into the plaza and up the staircase to your left.”

Following her directions, he lobbed a flashbang into a group of Muertos that ran out of a store, guns in hand, and graced them each with a bullet.

He reloaded as he ran and found Hanzo on the roof shooting scatter arrows into the mess below while Satya kneeled at the ground creating one of her lotus shaped teleporters. She didn’t look up from her work, the sound of his spurs enough to announce his presence.

“Agent McCree.” she greeted, and nodded at the sound of her turrets doing their job down in the plaza. “I sus- no, I… I fear there’s something I may have missed in our inspection of the power plant yesterday. That Talon is here aiding the Muertos can be no coincidence. They must want something, and I doubt their goal is the fusion core, or else their plan to capture it would be better conceived than what they are doing now.”

“What do you know, Agent Symmetra?”

“It’s nothing I know. It’s… a feeling. A feeling this is some sort of distraction. I wish to act upon it. I’m requesting I be allowed to go on ahead of the group. I have knowledge of the ziggurat’s layout, having studied it during our visit. If something is amiss, I will find it in the commotion. With your permission, I can set up a teleporter from here to have a way back should I be discovered.”

Jesse turned to Hanzo, got a nod, then looked back at her to repeat the motion. “Alright. Do it.”  

Satya stood, having finished setting up her teleporter, and pulled more hard light from her palm. She ordered Hanzo to hold out his arms, and when he did, a pod materialized and nearly made him drop Storm Bow.

“What is this?” Hanzo asked, hefting it so it rested against his shoulder.

“A shield generator.” Her severe expression dissipated for a moment. “Just cleared experimental stages, but I am sure you will be able to manage. After all, your lack of qualifications does not impede upon your ability to press a couple of buttons.”

Hanzo gave a short laugh, and she nodded at him. Then she frowned and looked out. “I must go. I will keep my line open and alert you of anything I find.”

_“Ganbare.”_ Hanzo urged her, and she nodded once more, then ran off. Then they hastened to join the team and help finish pushing the truck through the final archway. [22]

Into a new street they went. Littering the floor were marigolds, shopping bags, and random articles of clothing. People peeked out from windows and hid around corners, ignoring the police’s call for them to clear the area.

Fareeha touched down, and a LumériCo guard saluted them, volunteering to drive the truck to the ziggurat. Junkrat clambered out, and he and Roadhog walked at either side of the truck. Fareeha jumped atop of it, and Angela joined Hanzo on the roofs as Jesse took position guarding the back.

The moment of quiet didn’t last long. A door slammed open and all Jesse could do was scream at everyone to get down when he saw a grenade sail through the air in front of their path.

Mercy swooped down, her staff shining brightly and healing their wounds even as they formed. Jesse watched in twisted fascination as the red welts on his right arm receded. He used his metal hand to pull himself up to take cover behind the truck. One glance was enough to see the damage the explosion had caused to a small house along the path.

_“Ahí había gente inocente, pinche cobarde!”_ [23] screamed a man with tattoos that branded him a Muerto to a Talon agent at the doorway from where the grenade had been thrown. The Talon agent being yelled at only pushed him aside and walked down the steps. He pulled up his grenade launcher for another shot.

An arrow lodged itself in his helmet before he could pull the trigger.

“You must go, now. I see a teleporter not three houses away by the drop off. It has already let through a considerable amount of foes.” Hanzo warned.

“I’ll take care of it.” Fareeha said, and she flew off, already readying her weapon.

Hanzo lay cover fire as they ran the final stretch to the ziggurat, the truck stalling often as they were delayed by a mix of Talon and Muertos that sprung from alleys. After emptying his bullets in the bodies of four of them, Jesse stopped to catch his breath outside the wrought iron gates in front of the president’s statue. Hanzo leaped down from the garden wall and joined him. On his back tucked beneath his quiver, he carried Symmetra’s shield.

Jesse jerked his chin at it “You figure that thing out?”

Hanzo winced and looked over to the pod. “It is programmed to latch onto our signatures and provide us with protection as long as we remain within the area of coverage but… she did not leave instructions. As it turns out, it is not as simple as pressing a few buttons.”

“D’ya know the range of it?”

“If we hide it somewhere around here, it would reach well into the ziggurat.”

Jesse hummed and thought, and Hanzo whipped around to shoot off a sonar arrow and then dispatch a scatter one to take care of the few that tried to sneak up on them from behind a little mom-and-pop shop.

He listened to their teammate’s chatter on the line as things momentarily calmed after Fareeha took care of the teleporter. “Tell you what, you go up on that balcony over yonder,” he pointed to the white building across the street, “And keep watch. I’ll plant this just inside the garden here and try to make sense of it.”

McCree took the pod from him and Hanzo did as told. It took about three minutes of poking at the damn thing before calling it and switching to Satya’s personal line. All he got was static.

“Well fuck.” He stood and wiped his hands, then he heard the _chomp_ and resulting scream of someone walking into Jamie’s claw trap.

“We got some more!” announced the Junker, followed by the screech of metal that was his partner’s shrapnel gun. Jesse ran out of the little garden and shot a thumbs down at Hanzo. Pharah reached them again and joined Angela at shooting while hovering in the air.

“Reaper was at the teleporter, but I think he’s taken care of. Rutledge! Watch your six!”

Winston and Athena guided their movements towards the pyramid. When Jesse made it around the corner, the ziggurat came into full view. It was an impressive sight despite the fighting at the foot of it, gleaming in the early afternoon sun. He put his back to a concrete wall and peeked around to make note of his targets’ locations, then looked back to the road they just cleared, eyes going up automatically to check on Hanzo on the balcony opposite the president’s statue.

Hanzo was looking right back at him, brown eyes wide in fear, inky black hair melting into the darkness that bloomed just behind him.  

The curve of his bow and the blue ink of his arm was lost in a pool of thick, smothering nothingness. The darkness at his throat turned to ivory claws, a mask of a barn owl loomed over his head. Smoke rose from the figure and curled around the archer, encasing him, nearly swallowing him whole.

What he could still see of Hanzo’s face was quickly turning blue as he struggled to breathe.

“Hanzo!” He screamed. He didn’t think, his arm went up to shoot the Reaper and behind him Junkrat perked up in attention. Jesse turned away from the ziggurat and ran back to the smooth white building, heart pounding a furious, terrified beat in his throat.

He didn’t expect the bullet to do much good other than distract the wraith, gain its attention long enough to buy him time.

But his aim was true, and the Reaper let out an ugly howl when his shot landed in the eye hole of its mask. It recoiled enough for Hanzo to free his left arm, but it pulled at him again, and now Jesse was close enough to hear what its gargled voice was chanting over and over again.

_“Die die die die.”_

He shot its other eye, and Hanzo roared with the effort it took to pull himself completely free. He tried jumping down but it reached for him again, and they grappled on the edge of the balcony.

Jesse watched Hanzo’s feet slip on the ledge, watched his mouth form an ‘o’ in surprise as he suddenly went weightless three stories off the ground. Wispy black hands still latched onto the grey silk of his _gi._

Jesse ran.

 

_Alone. Always alone. No one cares enough to stay, no one stays alive long enough to-_

 

It was too much. Strong as he was, catching more than a hundred pounds worth of muscle and sinew knocked him down to the ground, not to mention the added weight of a nightmare come to life.

But the weight of them had nothing on the weight that crushed his soul the second the black smoke wrapped around Jesse. His mind almost shut down against the helplessness that flooded into him.

 

_A bovine skull in the sun. His mother’s pleading voice. A needle, a choice. News reports of a crater where Headquarters should have stood._

 

His body struggled to fight off the Reaper as it found new prey, vaguely aware Hanzo was still caught in its clutches and fighting just as hard, even weakened as he was.

 

_Hanzo_

 

All that talk about this fucking wraith wanting _him._ Well, time to put that theory to the test.

He stopped fighting the Reaper. He swung an arm over his eyes as he popped a flashbang from his belt and set it off right in the middle of the fray.

He shook his head to clear off the residual shock and used the Reaper’s temporary stiffness to haul an equally stunned Hanzo up and hurl him as far as he could.

Jamison appeared out of nowhere to grab the rousing archer and deposit him behind the safety of the garden wall just as the Reaper regained its wits. Jamie pulled the spiked tire from his back and began revving it up. Head pounding, battered and bruised, Jesse stood to face off against the Reaper. Stupid, but he wasn’t known for making the rational decisions.

“Heard you were lookin’ for me.” he said. The Reaper surged up, taller than Jesse, but not by much. It couldn’t seem to hold its form, flickering in and out of solidity. “Ain’t real chatty today, are ya? Thought you wanted to have a nice talk back in Gibraltar, Reaper. Consider this your rain check.”

It remained silent. Tendrils of smoke snaked out to the bodies of a few Muertos, and the black became opaque. It looked to McCree and his gun.

It turned out shadow monsters were just as easy to read as omnics and humans.

“So you feed off the dead, huh? What better way than to do the killin’ yerself, then? Go on.” He spread his arms, and the smoke rushed at him.  

He fought back the sick feeling in his gut, and twisted in its grasp, moved to the side and strained his neck to get a visual on the teammate behind them. “Jamie! Launch it!”

“But!”

“Jamison!” If he had to take some heat to take the sonuvabitch down, well. He still had plenty more limbs left.

“Alright, fine! Keep your hat on, jeez!” He heard the rev and the blast-off. Felt an oncoming rush of wind. “Or don’t. Rest in pieces!”

The tire hit the Reaper, but the blast hit him too.

 

Too bright. Too much.

 

He blinked, and suddenly there was a slight blue sheen over his skin, hexagonal grafts shimmering faintly over the leather of his glove and the dusting of hair and scars on his arm.

Symmetra’s shield. Hanzo figured it out after all.

He was blown back onto a display at a storefront, a sign reading _Abarrotes ‘Graciela’_ swinging precariously over his head at the impact. Hanzo ran to him and immediately fell to a crouch next to him, an arrow nocked and ready as he relayed their position to their teammates on the line. Jesse flailed, buried under bright pink and orange boxes as he struggled to resurface and watch for the reappearance of the wraith.

“That was foolish of you!” Hanzo hissed as he reached into the mess to haul Jesse up by his sarape. “What if I had not managed to activate the shield!? You could have-!”

“I’m fine! Just took a tumble.” The spot where he had been blasted from was stained black. McCree put an elbow down into a mess of cardboard and strawberry jelly. Hanzo sputtered at him, citing the risks and the probability of death at such close proximity to an explosion, screaming, “What were you thinking? You could have died!”

“I was thinkin’,” he shoved him back to get a look at the angry bruising on his chest where the smoke had tried to squeeze the life out of him, “I was thinkin’ that I didn’t want _you_ to!” He yelled right back, nerves already rattled at both their close calls. “Think I’ve had more than a lifetime’s worth of you nearly dyin’ on me, sweetheart!”

Hanzo opened his mouth to snap something, but gave pause. He drew in a shaky breath, ran and equally shaky hand over the fabric of his sarape to wipe off debris and frosting. “You… You saved my life.”

“Didn’t even get shot doin’ it.” he tried for a smile to calm them both down.

“Do not jest.” Beneath his anger was fear, a fear Jesse knew only too personally.

But jesting was all Jesse had. “Last time I told ya my life belonged to you, so how ‘bout now? Are we even?”

“I never wanted…” Hanzo shook his head and exhaled so forcefully it almost sounded like a snort. He stood up and walked away to stand guard, agitated. _“Boku no jinsei wa kimi…”_ [24]

Jesse puzzled over whatever Hanzo was muttering, but decided to shrug it off. Peacekeeper lay on a pile of mush right next to him, and he tried to clean the frosting off on his pants. He had fallen onto a rack of snacks cakes, the image of a smiling duck greeted him when he finally looked down to assess the damage.

Hanzo was alive, Junkrat may have managed to actually kill the Reaper, the rest of the team was nearly at the ziggurat, and Jesse had just found dessert.

_“Oye Hanzito!”_ he called out, rolling off the stand and brandishing one of the bright orange boxes. [25] Hanzo fell back against the wall to look down at him quickly, but got distracted by the dead bodies lying around sporting holes and arrows in their skulls. The wails of panicked citizens and the distant sound of fighting surrounded their little patch of peace.

“Agent McCree.” he responded, trying to remind him to keep to their call signs. Jesse grinned, euphoric from the adrenaline coursing through his veins. They were alive. Overwatch had the upper hand, the fight was good, and there were bells ringing in the distance. The sky was big and wide and blue.

_“Quieres un Gansito?”_ He shook the box at him, making sure the smiling duck was in full view.[26]

“What?” Hanzo answered flatly, the sound of his disdainful voice followed by a snorting laugh that was not his own.

McCree scrambled to his feet and Hanzo brought Storm Bow around to aim at the specter taking shape right in the spot it had died. Wispy and no doubt still weak from being blown to timbuktu by Jamison, it glided to them. Its shoulders were shaking, hooded head dipped down against its chest in an effort to hide its laughter.

It wasn’t very effective.

Laughter, but not like the ghastly unpleasant thing he and Lúcio heard in the hallway in the basement of Gibraltar. No, this one was a deep rumble rasping out of vocal cords gone brittle with disuse. Hell, it could have seemed warm and fond if it weren’t for the tendrils of smoke drifting ominously past their ankles, curling up their calves. Hanzo froze, eyes going wide and fearful.

Jesse drowned in memories.

Memories of that laugh. Odd, out of place, but familiar. Achingly familiar. Like a half-forgotten dream. A retreating back, a large warm hand between his shoulder blades. The sound of his mother singing Selena out on the balcony.

Jesse and Hanzo watched, fixed stances and weapons at the ready to open fire. Waiting for it to make a move against them. But it just stood there, siphoning whatever life force remained in the Muertos around them, chest heaving in a fit of giggles that gained strength as it went, sounding less and less like dying breaths and more- more _human._

Its twin guns hung uselessly at its side until finally, it spoke.

_“‘Hanzito quieres un Gansito?’ Pero si que eres de lo más idiota, mijo!”_ [27]

His heart had been racing moments before, pulse a heavy thrum from the thrill of the mission, the mortal thrall to stay alive.

At the Reaper’s words, at the Reaper’s laugh, the blood in his veins froze. Jesse’s breath caught. He could have been in the middle of the Deadeye for all the world ceased to move around him. A cowboy and a ghost trapped at its center.

The voice was wrong, wrong, so wrong. It was supposed to be _wrong._ The Reaper was not supposed to sound anything like the comforting baritone that berated him since the early years of his adulthood. That praised him when he did well, or yelled when he disobeyed in the field. The voice that had cried on a night in São Paulo when Jesse’s life blood spilled to pool on the floor.

“What did you call me?” he asked, voice refusing to tremble, refusing to believe the idea his mind latched onto. The sound of it caught Hanzo’s attention, and his gaze flickered over to him, concerned and questioning.

The Reaper didn’t answer.

“McCree?” Hanzo asked.

What was worse, thinking back he could almost spot the resemblance between the specter and the man. No doubt this is what the Soldier had meant.  

_“Que me acabas de decir?”_ he ground out, voice edging between hope and dread. [28] It couldn’t be a coincidence. It couldn’t _be_. It couldn’t be that on the Day of the Dead, on the day Jack Morrison decided to claw his way out of his fucking grave, that-

_“Te dije mi hijo.”_ [29]

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. So? I don’t know. Have this, I guess. Idk what to write on here. This shitfuck chapter is running on 16k and i’ve run out of coherent words.
> 
> Songs referenced jic u wanna listen:  
> Juice by Chance the Rapper  
> Suavemente by Elvis Crespo  
> Bailame Despacio by Xantos y Dynell
> 
> Translations:  
> [1]Twenty years old?!  
> [2]Good night  
> [3]I don’t know  
> [4]honorific/formal speech  
> [5]the festival of light  
> [6]Hey beautiful. Wanna dance?  
> [7]Um… i guess i’ll translate the song:  
> Kiss me softly- I want to feel your lips kissing me again, softly- kiss me, kiss me softly- kiss me once again- softly. That choir! Kiss me! Is the thing! I want to feel your lips- kiss me, darling, catch this!  
> [8]Excuse me  
> [9]And? The other song?:  
> Dance for me slowly, don’t look at the clock, I don’t want this night to end- and I still don’t dare. Give me a sign to let me lose my fear- I’d die to have you always with me. I don’t want to lose you, I’m convinced that- you think of me as I think of you. Speak clearly, let’s not waste time.  
> [10]Hands in the air! Don’t move!  
> [11]Take your hands out of your pockets, asshole!  
> [12]And you. Don’t even think about alerting the rest, unless you want to come out of this dead instead of alive with the lives of your compatriots on your conscience.  
> [13]One in the back: Omnics don’t have a conscience./ Omnic: Really, Pablo? You’re gonna start this shit right now?  
> [14]Who, Sombra? The hacker? Yeah, she was a Muerto long ago, but she disappeared. There hasn’t been any contact between her and us, at least not for the past year. If you’re looking for her, and if you find her, slap her for me, will you?  
> [15]And what did she do to deserve…?  
> [16]Omnic: Hey isn’t this the guy that robbed the Bank of Dorado last year?  
> Girl: You’re right, man! He sure looks like it!  
> Omnic: And isn’t this one...  
> [17]It’s Jesse McCree! So they’re the ones with Overwatch!  
> [18]The posters say ‘Dead or Alive’!  
> [19]Son of a bitch! You don’t have the right to talk about her when you’re the bastard that left her behind!”  
> [20]Don’t talk about what you don’t understand!  
> [21]If you could get me the oysters *fuck i don’t know what a la diabla translates to in english. Like? Spicy and grilled? They good. Anyway* and get him the crab *fuck. Again. It’s a kind of soupy dish. It’s also good.*  
> [22]Good luck/Do your best  
> [23]There were innocent people in there, you fucking coward!  
> [24]My life is...  
> [25]Hey, Hanzito!  
> [26]You want a Gansito? (its a snack cake. They good)  
> [27]’Hanzito do you want a Gansito?’ Well aren’t you the biggest idiot, son!  
> [28]What did you just call me?  
> [29]I called you my son.  
>   
> hmu on tumblr here if u wanna 
> 
> Sorry for the wait, but thanks for being patient and as always, thank you for reading! And for commenting and kudos… kudos-ing? Kudo-ing?


	16. El Son De Los Reyes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took a long while, but in my excuse im a teacher, my guys. we’re learning months rn. one student thinks “stinger” is “September”, another said “pants” is “October”, i tried erasing the whiteboard with a chalkboard eraser, and as u can see… yea 
> 
> u know the drill. end notes, translations. hover over for kanji on pc

In his lifetime, Hanzo had seen exactly one (1) western movie. A 2050’s remake of some 1960’s classic. And although it was critically acclaimed, it was also agreed upon that it did not hold a candle to the original. The title, he recalled, had something to do with the fight between the good and the bad. Or was it good and evil?

…Ugly?

No matter.

There was one scene from the film he remembered. A gunslinger standing at the tip of an equilateral triangle, facing down an outlaw with a bounty on his head and an ambitious man turned corrupt.

In the right circles in Japan, Hanzo still had a bounty on his head. Corruption was devouring the souls of the departed around them. And the gunslinger...  

The gunslinger stood across from the wraith, gun drawn. There were bells tolling in the distance.

McCree even had the sarape. Maybe he took inspiration from that same western. In any other moment, Hanzo thought that if he threw out a quip about the ridiculousness of the scene they found themselves in to point out the discrepancies in their characters, McCree would laugh. Then perhaps scold him for having watched the remake instead of the original.

In any other moment, Hanzo knew McCree would laugh.

But in that moment, laughter seemed the farthest thing from Jesse’s mind. And laughter, much like Hanzo, had no place being there.

 _“Te dije mi hijo.”_ [1]

In that moment, the Reaper was just a man. And in an odd moment of disconnect, Hanzo realized that if Jesse was supposed to be the gunslinger, then he wasn’t a fast enough draw. He didn’t shoot first.

The Reaper’s words were akin to bullets. They hit Jesse square in the chest, blew his eyes open wide with rage and grief, knocked him off balance. Hanzo broke the angles of the perfect triangle to rush to his side and stand together. He had heard the tales from his teammates, and even if he had never faced the Reaper before today, he knew the danger he posed. This was not likely a fight they could win alone, especially not with McCree as affected as he seemed.

“You-” Jesse’s throat seemed to close around the singular word, heavy with disbelief. He fell back a step, his spurs jingling merrily in the heavy absence of his usual chatter. Hanzo drew the string of Storm Bow further, mind overcome with a dread that was nothing like what he had felt while trapped in the monster’s claws.

One of the first things he had ever picked out about McCree’s character was how fond the man was of running his mouth. He talked when he was thinking, jabbered to distract, and spoke nonsense to fill a void. The soothing cadence of his voice had calmed Hanzo enough times he knew all the posturing for what it was. Getting in the first word gave him an advantage, more time to think. A white pawn moving across a chessboard.

For him to not be speaking...

 _“Y donde se fue mi perico? No te sale ni pío!”_ [2]

“Reyes.” Jesse choked out. Hanzo startled at his side. Reyes. Gabriel Reyes? The Blackwatch Commander? _His_ commander? Hanzo hastened to search his memory and recall that night on the couch and McCree’s soft, sad voice. Gabriel Reyes was dead. His was the only body they managed to recover in enough pieces for a proper burial. How could Gabriel Reyes be in front of them? How could Overwatch’s alleged traitor be standing right there, a nightmare in the flesh?

McCree voiced his thought. “Gabe? What the hell-?”

He cut himself off when the Reaper moved, arms going up to aim identical pistols at them both.

The Reaper had sounded like a man before, but his voice fell back to its usual rasp. “Don’t call me that.”

The dam broke, and Jesse found his voice. “What the hell is happening here? What the _hell?_ _How?_ How is this you? How can you be here too?” He paused to draw breath, and Hanzo saw Reaper twitch. “Answer me, Gabe!”

Hanzo shoved Jesse down, and two bullet holes appeared on the wall behind where they had just been standing. They landed on the pile of mashed snack cakes, and Hanzo rolled and let an arrow fly, then nocked another when it hit the cobblestones and Reaper reformed his body a meter to the left.

“So you’ve seen him.”

Jesse stood and shoved Hanzo behind him, but Hanzo stepped to the side and kept his arrow aimed at the eye socket of the owl mask.

“You’ve seen Jack.”

Jesse gave a mirthless huff of a laugh. “Oh, so you already know about him too, huh?”

“Where is he?”

“I ain’t tellin’ you shit ‘til you do some explainin’ of your own, Reyes! God fuckin’ damn, how didn’t I see it?!” Jesse was shaking, agitated, and Hanzo worried about how his emotional state would affect his aim when he had the mind to remember about the gun in his hand. “The playbook! My old fuckin’ teammates workin’ to kill me on that train! And the Reap-... you. You! YOUR fucking vendetta against me! I don’t-!”

His voice shook and broke. He sucked in a breath, and Hanzo desperately thought there was something he should _do._ Call the others, step in between them, unleash the dragons, _something._ Something to end the pain he felt coming from the man in front of him in waves.

“I don’t _understand.”_ Heartbreak. Jesse’s voice sounded like heartbreak. “Were they right? Was it true? Was it really you that shot Overwatch in the back!?”

“I asked you: where is Jack?” The Reaper took aim, looking to intimidate an answer out of him. Jesse responded by lifting Peacekeeper. His arm was steady.

“And I asked you how the fuck you’re alive. Funny, we both ain’t seem t’be gettin’ our answers.”

 _“Andale pues,_ I’ll go first. Here’s your answer, _pendejo;_ I’m not alive.” [3]

“Then what the fuck are you?”

Gabriel Reyes laughed, and Hanzo felt a shiver run down his spine. It sounded nothing like the laugh he had given before when he teased Jesse for his poor joke. Jesse brought his left hand back to grip Hanzo’s arm and forced his bow down. His grip was strong enough to bruise.

“Why don’t you ask Angela? In fact, why don’t we both go ask Angela? Then you can bury her like she buried me once I-” Peacekeeper’s safety clicked, and Reaper stiffened.

“You’d kill her?” Jesse asked, voice cold. Hanzo diverted his attention from the Reaper to him for just a second, and saw a red glint in his eye that brought back the memory of agonizing pain to the right side of his chest.

Reaper’s head tilted to the side, sizing McCree up. When he spoke and broke the tense stillness, he sounded curious.

“How much soul is left in that deadeye of yours?”

Jesse’s finger left the trigger guard. He shot, but the Reaper disappeared. Hanzo wrenched his arm free and flexed it, preparing. He would have to risk weakening himself in case the dragons did the Reaper no effect, but he had to act.

“What are you doing in Gibraltar, _Jesse McCree?”_

Jesse wasn’t offering the Reaper any answers, and Reaper didn’t keep to one spot long enough for Hanzo to launch his attack. He slid his arrow back in his quiver and felt for a different one.

“Overwatch is dead, and you were never for it. You aren’t for it now. You’re Blackwatch through and through, _mijo.”_

A sonar arrow flew, and Hanzo followed it up with his final scatter arrow. A screech signaled he’d hit, and smoke flowed from an alley and thinned out. It seemed his speaking ability was tied to his humanoid form. Hanzo and Jesse stood back to back, eyes searching for that smoke to recondense.

When it did, it whispered. “Overwatch doesn’t know any better now than it did then. You can’t protect them, _Jessito._ Come with me.”

“Like hell!” Jesse shouted, and Reaper disappeared behind the shop’s wall. “C’mon, Gabe! _Sal de ahí!”_ [4]

“-can’t protect them. You can’t protect any of them!” Reaper said from the right, falling in and out of sight. Hanzo took aim.

“That shield of Satya’s still active, sweetheart?” Jesse whispered to him.

It took Hanzo a second to register he was being spoken to. “On me, yes. You used yours in your suicide attempt.” Hanzo snapped back, nerves still frayed from that particular event.

“Oh. Good then.”

“Not good! What are you planning to-?” Static from the comm buzzed in his ear.

“This is Pharah, responding to a report from Agent Junkrat. He ran back here claiming that he… he blew up Jesse? But Athena’s reading his vitals as fine. We’ve almost cut through the Muerto’s roadblock and are entering the ziggurat. Do you need help?”

“No.” Jesse answered.

“Yes!” Hanzo hissed back. Paranoia got the better of him and he shot an arrow into the shadow of a building. He cursed and pulled out another, then cursed again realizing he was running dangerously low.

“You stay right where you are Faree, you don’t needa-”

“Reaper is Gabriel Reyes and we are engaging!” Hanzo spoke over him. From Fareeha’s end came silence. More static.

Then, _“Akhi,_ please don’t do anything stupid, I’m on my way.”  

Then suddenly from his left, a cold and rasping, “Last chance, _ingrato._ ”

This time, it was Jesse that shot, fanning the hammer as he followed the Reaper’s half-formed figure circling around them. “You had to drag me kickin’n’screamin’ the last time, Reyes. I ain’t gonna make it any easier for you this time!”

Egging him on meant the Reaper had to show himself to speak, but still, Hanzo wished Jesse wouldn’t do it. He didn’t need the dragons raging within him to feel the threat in the air. His fingers itched to let the arrow loose. He wanted to scream, call the deities forth and be done with this mission and its ghosts.

“Rocket barrage incoming!” Fareeha’s voice sounded in their ears. Hanzo glanced up and saw her silhouetted in the sunlight. The dragons’ warning increased in urgency tenfold.

“GABRIEL!” She shouted from above. Reaper reformed half a meter from where they stood and looked to the source of his name. Hanzo grabbed McCree by the back of his sarape and yanked him through the door of the little convenience store behind them, then shoved him beneath the pay counter. Reaper stalked after them.

 _“Sal de ahí, Jessito,”_ The eerie sound of Reaper’s voice in sing-song made the hair on the back of Hanzo’s neck stand on end. _“Sal de ahí, Jessito, Jessito. Sal de ahí de ese lugar.”_ [5]

Jesse tried to tell Fareeha to stop. He got as far as screaming her and Gabriel’s names, planting a knee down to propel himself back out in the mess before Hanzo tripped him and hauled him back to wrestle him under the shelter of the counter.

Jesse fought him until the first missile hit. Then he went still, and it was easy for Hanzo to cover him with his body to pin him down. The proximity of the explosions shook the little shop building’s walls, and Hanzo grit his teeth against the earth-shaking loudness of it, feeling the rattle right down to his bones.

Even after the last of Pharah’s projectiles were deployed and the world had stopped quaking, Hanzo didn’t dare move. Not until the clouds of dust around them began to settle and a heavy crunch of footsteps announced Pharah’s presence.

“He’s gone.” She said.

Hanzo let himself fall back to sit on the floor and eyed the wreckage around them. There were new holes blasted through the building’s walls. The racks across from them were tipped over, their contents spilled onto the floor or buried under segments of the ceiling that had come crashing down.

“Are you certain?”

“It seems it takes a while for him to reform after being hit that bad. Same thing happened at the teleporter. We should move fast. The job is almost done, we’re just waiting on-”     

“Gabe?” McCree’s whispered question cut her off. Hanzo scooted back and Fareeha fell to a crouch and took the hat from his head to smooth back his hair.

With the hat gone, Hanzo got a good look at McCree’s face. His eyes wide and bloodshot, body held so tight it looked painful. Hanzo looked down and saw his white-knuckled grip around the skull of his prosthetic. “He’s gone.” He answered. After a second, he added, “Fareeha is here.”

“Gone?” Jesse repeated.

Fareeha’s head dipped down and blocked Hanzo’s view of him. “Yes. He’s gone Jesse. But you need to explain. What did he say? Did he-?”

Jesse’s frantic voice overpowered hers. “He’s gone? I couldn’t-? I tried to-!” His breathing quickened, making it hard for him to speak, and Hanzo crawled forward quickly, but Fareeha moved back before he could tell her to give him space.

“Jesse?” She asked softly, laying a gentle hand over his thigh, “Jesse, it’s me, Fareeha. This is my hand on your knee. You’re alright. Do you know where you are? Come on, _akhi_. Where are you?”

“M-Mexico?”

“Alright. Give me more. Where in Mexico?”

“I couldn’t save him. I wasn’t fast enough, I-!”

“Jesse! You’re in Mexico! Dorado, Veracruz! Hanzo is here, so am I. You’re safe. What year is it?”

He forced his eyes shut and sucked in a deep breath, let it out, then took in another. “2.. 2076?”

“Good.” She exhaled, and stood back up. “Think you can finish the rest?”

“Dorado, Veracruz. Year 2076.” His voice regained its usual strength. Hanzo blinked at the swiftness of the change. “20’ fuckin’ ‘76 and both Jack Morrison and Gabriel Reyes are still alive. It’s November first, the Day of the damn Dead.” Jesse looked up to snatch his hat from Fareeha’s hand and put it back on, then pulled down the rim to hide his face. “Give… give me a minute.”

Neither Hanzo or Fareeha made to follow him when he stood and went to pace down the ruined aisles. Hanzo turned to Fareeha and asked, “How-?”

“Deadlock. Long story. But I used to have to do that for mom sometimes too.” She answered with a shrug stunted by her Raptora suit. She sighed and ran a hand over her face. “Was it really Gabe? The Reaper...”

“He confirmed his identity, or as good as.” Hanzo frowned, but turned to look up at Jesse. “I trust his judgement. Were you awaiting confirmation to inform the others?”  

Fareeha shook her head. “No. After Jack, I… I told Angela right away where I was headed.”

“Angela.” Her name finally managed to snap Jesse back to himself. He shook off his sarape and marched back to offer a hand down to lift Hanzo up. “Angie… somethin’ he said about her… it ain’t sittin’ right. She and I gotta have a talk. But first, we’ve got a payload to deliver.”

The three of them climbed out of the wreckage of the shop, and Hanzo fell behind to retrieve some of his arrows. They ran to the delivery area of the ziggurat, shot down a few straggling Muertos and Talon agents that tried to block their way, and Jesse called for an update on the comm. “Agent Mercy, how’re we doin’?

Dr. Ziegler answered in a clearly relieved, but also highly strung-out, voice. “Oh, thank goodness! Jesse! Are you alright?”

“I’m fine, Angie. How’re things on your end? We’re headed over.”

“The Junkers and I have made it into the ziggurat and are through the doors of the installation point. But Jesse, if that was Gabriel, then what if what Jack said...?”

“Yeah, I’ve been havin’ the same thought. Has Satya checked in yet?”

“No. I tried calling her line directly, but it was occupied.” Mercy answered.

“Alright. You hold down the fort, give us a minute.” Jesse reloaded his gun as he ran, and Hanzo absently rolled his shoulder to try and fight back the soreness that remained from his tussle with the Reaper and their resulting fall.

Jesse caught the movement and fell behind Fareeha to match his pace.

“You doin’ alright there, sweetheart?”

“I am fine.” He answered, harsher than he might have meant to, but nevertheless he went on. “Are you?”

“I’m fine, archer.” The smile he gave him seemed genuine enough. “Don’t you worry about me.”

“Are you certain?”

“Yes.” This smile was accompanied by a little chuckle. Hanzo peered up at him suspiciously as they dove into the belly of the ziggurat.

“You’re... frighteningly well-adjusted.”

Jesse laughed at that. “You think? Well then, I’ll take that as a compliment!”

Fareeha let them both go on ahead, citing the need to keep watch. They were met with the mayhem left behind in a damage-boosted Junkrat’s wake. The ziggurat’s pristine walls and teal floors were scuffed with evidence of multiple grenade blasts. They followed the carnage around to where Roadhog stood guard outside the doors to the central core.

“G’day!” Chirped Jamison from the core’s control panel. Angela fluttered down in front of Jesse. She lifted a hand to his cheek and frowned, a question in her eyes. When he shook his head at her and muttered, “Later,” Hanzo knew that his assurances of being fine were well delivered lies.

“What’s the hold up, fellas?” Jesse asked the room at large.

“Well we’re here tryna figure out whether’r’not to install this core here,” Jamison gestured at the banged up truck beside him, “And I got a feelin’ the quicker we decide the better. No tellin’ when more baddies’ll come bangin’ through the glass.”

Hanzo looked up and confirmed that there were multiple broken windows on the pyramid’s face.

“What of Satya? Was she not sent here to investigate the integrity of the mission?” Hanzo spoke up, and got his answer from the comm in his ear.

“Winston here. About your request, Agent Mercy... Athena can’t locate Agent Symmetra either. It seems she’s blocking attempts with her headset.”

The team burst into worried chatter, Jesse turned to Hanzo, “She could be in trouble. Think you can find her?”   

Hanzo felt even more anxiety tug at his gut. Satya’s behavior as of late had been cagey, and he was worried. He nodded. “I will find her. In the meantime, try the line again.”

He moved off of the runway and into the offices and workplaces in the main segment of the pyramid, picking off straggling enemies as he went. On the group line, Mercy tried again. “Agent Symmetra, we are ready to finalize installation of the fusion core. If you’ve found nothing of issue, please report. We have taken the point and will proceed on your recommendation.”

Once he found the ground floor to be clear, he peered up at the catwalks built along the glass face of the pyramid and began climbing. He felt eyes on him, and turned his head to catch McCree’s gaze before he turned back to the core.

“Symmetra, you out there?” McCree called out on the comm one more time.

“This is Agent Symmetra.” Hanzo breathed a sigh of relief when her cool voice joined the line. He found another foothold and propelled himself up further. “I am currently located in the main hub of the ziggurat and tapped into their security network. Everything… everything is as it should be. There is nothing to report.”

“Alright.” Came McCree’s response. “You heard her, let’s finish the job. Mercy, I want you off the objective. Stay back in case we’ve got any others incoming. Pharah, you stand guard out there, but be careful. Hanzo? You up there still? Go on and group up with your architech and meet us back here.”

Hanzo gave a grunt of affirmation, redirecting towards the center of the pyramid.

“Right, well. None o’ the workers are around. How do we do this?” McCree was saying. “Should we wait for Vaswani?”

“I can do it!” Jamison responded eagerly. “I took notes!”  

Hanzo pulled himself onto the catwalk, stood, then winced when he felt glass shards shift in between the plating of his soles. He took the handheld from his belt and pulled the screen open. He squinted at the schematics on the screen, then looked around himself to get his bearings.

His private comm line pinged just as Jamison crowed success on the installation, and he drew his finger to his ear to switch channels.

“Hanzo.” Satya’s voice was thin, full of trepidation. “Agent Hanzo, come in.”

“Satya?” He ran forward, following the map. “I’m nearly to your location. We’ve made our final approach.”

“I- I made a-a…” Her voice trembled, and Hanzo heard her take a steadying breath. “I… I made… a mistake.”

“Once the ziggurats go online, we will be able to retreat. We only have a few enemies left.” He closed the map and swept the floor below him. “Is that you by the-” Hanzo cut himself off, pulled Storm Bow from his back, and nocked one of his few remaining arrows.

Symmetra’s cyan blue form stood before the wide screen on the wall across from a platform overlooking the delivery route. She was typing away at a keyboard, and behind her, inching closer with a machine pistol drawn, was a figure glowing purple.

“Satya!” He shouted a warning. The figure turned, and Hanzo recognized the purple-haired woman from the plaza the night before. The suspicious one that had asked Satya to dance. Hanzo rushed forward to take his aim, shot, but slipped on the broken glass beneath his feet as the fletching brushed his gloved fingers.

Satya looked up, then raised an arm and screamed, “Hanzo! No-!”

He managed to catch himself before he fell tumbling to his death for the second time that day, and watched the woman fall to the floor with a scream.

Satya stood over her with pursed lips, then she turned back to the screen and Hanzo heard her voice in his ear.

“Hanzo, please come down and assist me.”

“Satya, we need to join the group. Why-?”

“Hanzo, please!” It was the desperation in her voice that made Hanzo shut his mouth and climb back down, then leap from another catwalk down to the platform. He rolled upon landing, and walked briskly past the girl writhing on the floor, spewing profanities in Spanish.

“What are you doing?” He asked firmly. On Satya’s screen were controls for the fusion core alignment, and the satellites that would connect LumériCo’s ziggurats and bring the system online all around Dorado. “What mistake? Who is she?” He gestured at the enemy girl and backed up a few steps to kick the pistol off the platform. When it skidded away, he spotted a familiar white skull pasted on its side.

Like the warehouse in Japan.

Satya was still typing determinedly. “She is Sombra,” she said, even as Hanzo connected the dots.

“You found her.” Hanzo said. He bristled, “You knew it was her yesterday, and you did not report her to McCree, even knowing that finding her was the purpose of this mission!”

“I will explain everything later Hanzo, but first-!”

“You will explain everything now!” He yelled, and yanked her back from the keyboard to look her in the face.

She looked ready to shove him off for daring to touch her, but a particularly vicious stream of curses in mixed languages from behind them both made her take a deep breath. “I lied. Under threat of blackmail, I came here on her orders because she swore she could prove Vishkar’s guilt in all allegations against us. The Soldier reported the truth. LumériCo does not have the citizens’ best interests in mind and they have struck a deal with Vishkar to use our sound tech to build a situation similar to that of Rio.” Then she really did shove him off and went back to typing. She pulled up multiple security feeds from the tops of the ziggurats’ reception towers. Mounted on them were speakers stamped with Vishkar’s blue logo.

“I chose not to warn the team. I lied to protect my company. I made a mistake.” Softer, she pleaded, “And I will fix it. Please understand.”

A bit hysterically, Hanzo longed for the days when he was alone and on the run, and emotional attachment played no part in his decision-making.

“Hanzo, please.”

Emotional attachment paired with a deep understanding of what it meant to be trapped under the thrall of honor and loyalty. “What do you need of me?”

“I can take care of stalling the connection. After, we must find a way to uninstall or destroy that fusion core. For now, take Sombra to Agent Mercy. Her wound must be seen to.”

 _“Que!?”_ The hacker screeched. The intensity of her glare was quite something for someone in so much pain. “No! No no no no no, I have seen what that doctor does, and I’d rather die, thank you!” [6]

“Mercy’s nanomolecular technology feels cold, but nothing more. There is nothing to fear.” Satya said dismissively, distracted by her task.

Sombra laughed, but stopped when she coughed out blood. “No. There’s no way I’m going to end up like Reaper. Take me back to Castillo, I’ve got a biotic emitter.”

Satya paused, considering. “I have a teleporter set up. We can-”

“No!” Hanzo cut her off. “She is the mission, and we have her under custody! Satya, we must report this!”

“If you let them arrest me, consider our ‘friendship’ over, Vaswani.” Sombra threatened, and Hanzo clicked his tongue. He reached up to switch back to the main line and report what had happened, but froze when Satya lifted her projector and aimed it at his chest.

The laser, not her charged shots. “Hanzo. I owe her. I need her.”

“Satya, put it down.”

“I cannot let you take her. I’ve stalled them. It’ll take the system fifteen minutes to reset. Warn the team, evacuate. I’ll trust you to see that the core is destroyed. Trust me to return.” She knelt next to the hacker, her photon projector still aimed at him. “I will return and I will take responsibility, I swear it.”

Her laser would weaken him, but Hanzo knew he could move quickly enough to disable her before it took its full effect. He knew she was aware of that as well. He held back a sigh, but made no effort to dial back the anger in his tone.  

“You threatened me, and what I am about to say was never said,” he warned her. He waited a beat before continuing. “You have until sundown.”

She didn’t relax. Her hand tightened on the handle of her projector. “Or?”

“Or you will have betrayed mine and Overwatch’s trust twice and I will consider you a traitor.” He said plainly. “Do not make me regret trusting you, Satya, because you will surely regret it if I do.”  

Her shoulders fell, and she relaxed. “I understand. Thank you.”

He helped her lift the hacker off the ground so that she could construct a gurney out of hard light. In his arms, Sombra tried for a conversational tone, or as much of one as she could manage with her voice straining in pain. They didn’t dare remove the arrow in fear she would bleed out externally as well as in.

“So, you’re the dragon guy, right?” She wheezed semi-casually. “Cool, cool. So are they- or you, like sharks? Are the dragons a euphemism? Do you have two dic-?”

Hanzo dropped her.

Unfortunately, she fell on the completed gurney, but she still yelped in pain.

Satya paid her no mind and straightened up. “My teleporter is around the corner. Twelve minutes now, Hanzo. I must go.”

“Till the sun sets, Satya.” He warned again. He watched them go and Sombra called out to him one more time as they turned away from sight.

“Say hi to your brother for me, _chulo!”_ The gurney and Satya’s heels disappeared behind the wall, and Hanzo heard the hum of her teleporter activating. “We should all go to Russia again someti-!”

Hanzo assumed her voice was swallowed in the teleportation and not her timely death, but he dearly wished that he hadn’t tripped and that his arrow had pierced her head.

Astute of her to throw her crime in his face when Hanzo had no choice but to let it go in favor of saving a city. Finally, he had someone to blame for his brother’s near death, and the pledge he had made to this naive heroic organization kept him from extracting revenge.

Right on cue, McCree’s voice came through the comm. “Hanzo? You find Satya yet? Installation’s done, but the damn thing ain’t connectin’.”

“Satya is gone.” Hanzo responded. “I will explain, but not now. We do not have time.” He jumped from the platform and ran for the central core. “She lied. There are Vishkar compound speakers mounted on the tops of each pyramid, and if we allow them to go online, it will no doubt result in a situation similar to Rio.”

“Shit.” Said the combined voices of Jesse, Fareeha... and Roadhog, if he wasn’t mistaken.

“Mmm.” Hanzo hummed to share in the sentiment, “Can we uninstall the core?”

“No, once it’s in there, it’s in there. And courtesy of our friend Fawkes here, it’s in there pretty damn good.” Jesse answered.

“I’d say you’re welcome, but it’s lookin’ like the situation isn’t all that partial to that.” said Jamison.

“So Jack was telling the truth.” Mercy’s voice. “What can we do?”

“Satya suggested destroying it.” Hanzo said. He turned and nodded at Roadhog, still standing guard. The rest were crowded around Jamison and the control panel. He joined them, panting slightly. “LumériCo is funded in part by the government. They probably know of this plot, and approved it.”

“Vishkar’s deal last year was signed by Portero.” Mercy bit her lip.  

“Meaning we will not get any official support, and they’re already aware the payload was delivered.” Pharah said. Hanzo heard the sound of her rockets as she flew to them.

“And LumériCo’s folks’re comin’ back now that we cleared the area of enemies. Shit. Winston’s not gonna like this.”

Hanzo turned to look at McCree, the team did the same. Pharah landed just behind her brother and said, “You have a plan?”

Jesse frowned, took a deep breath, and turned to her. “Yeah, but none of y’all’re gonna like it either. Listen, in the eyes of the government, I’m still a criminal-”

_“Akhi-”_

“Meanin’ no one’ll take too much convincin’ that you didn’t know I ordered y’all out of here to blow the place up-”

“Jesse, if you’re doing this to get out and have a chance to go after Gabriel-!” Angela flew herself over and pushed at his bronze chestplate, but he pulled her hands off, and they both started yelling at once. The team watched their exchange like a tennis match.

“Someone’s gotta do somethin’! It may as well be-”

“No! You are not _framing_ yourself!”

“Angie, these people might die if you don’t let me do this-!”

“You didn’t let me go after Jack, and you were right! I’m not letting you do this! Jesse, this is not how we handle things!”

“Right, if you don’t mind?” Jamison yelled over them both. He gestured between himself and his partner. “We can do it.”

He left the pair a little slackjawed, but it was McCree that composed himself first.

“Jamison, you wanted to go on the straight ‘n’ narrow. Now I appreciate the offer, but if you do this-”

“Maybe our bounty’ll finally be bigger than yours!” His manic grin slid off his face, and the resulting soberness was vaguely unsettling. “Listen, someone’s gotta do it, and if that thing back there was your Reyes person, then I got a feelin’ you Overwatch just stepped in a craphole.”

“You’re compromised.” Mako offered from his spot at the door.  

“And I’m not sure how straight ‘n’ narrow that makes ya. Look, you said people will die, didn’tcha? Like in Rio?”

Hanzo cleared his throat and spoke up. “No, not directly. But they will lose their homes, and people have died in the Rio revolts, so it is only logical to assume-”

“Then we’ll do it.” Jamison said.

“You evacuate.” Mako went to stand behind him, Mercy and Pharah nodded and began to do as told, and Jamison went on before McCree could open his mouth to protest again.

“Listen, it’s not like you sucked us into this against our will, Mr. McCree sir.” He hopped onto Mako’s shoulders and Mako began walking them around the core. Jamison’s eyes were bright with excitement. “You gave us a choice, and it’s been nice and all, but you don’t have much experience with explosions, now do ya? Me? Now I know how to keep a thing like this controlled. Besides,” He craned his neck down to address Mako, “I think it’s long past time we had a party, ‘ey Roadie? Whaddya say we bring on the fireworks!?”

Hanzo watched Jesse’s jaw clench, and stepped forward before he tried to stop them again.

“You only have eight minutes. Satya gave me her word she would return and assume responsibility. While we may not be able to help clear your name regarding past crimes, I will make sure this one is not held against you.”

Junkrat smiled his thanks and Hanzo bowed his head in respect. Pharah ushered the lot of them out while Mercy contacted Winston and told him to be prepared for hell from the press.

“Satya?” Fareeha hazarded to ask as they ran out of the ziggurat and into a mess of Mexican law enforcement and LumériCo employees about to re-enter the pyramid. Jesse yelled at them in Spanish, and they scattered to escort away nearby civilians under threat of a bomb.

Hanzo gritted his teeth at the memory of Sombra and promised, “Later.”

* * *

 

Winston did not take it well. The press didn’t take it well. The UN chose to suspend their activity under threat of freezing their assets. The world, if social media was to be an accurate gauge, figured that Overwatch’s past was repeating itself.

It probably didn’t help that this ‘betrayal’ ended in an explosion as well.

Their departure was scheduled for 1800, and since they were employed by LumériCo, and by extension the Mexican government, (and were decent people, despite what some were clamoring to say), they joined in the relief effort around the wounded city after they had given their official report. The fallout ranged from potholes to decimated property, and more than a few wounded.

Pharah and a team of firefighters pulled bodies from the building hit by Talon.

Mercy was hidden away in a clinic set up inside a nearby school, Jesse was ‘aiding’ the law on their manhunt for the Junkers, and Hanzo went with a few patrols to investigate where Talon had kept their weapons and men, and to keep an eye out for Satya. And while Hanzo was holding out for Satya’s return, upon hearing an edited version of what had happened, most of the team didn’t share his opinion.  

The authorities found Talon’s vacated hideouts, but any actual agents were either dead or long gone. The detectives took over then, and Hanzo left with a pair of lively officers that went off to help find and relocate wounded or displaced citizens. One spoke English, and she asked if Hanzo would prefer to work alone. He thanked her and parted ways, desperate to have time to himself to sort out all that had happened that day, the mess in his head. He headed back to the plaza, then took a smaller alley, looking for anyone in need of help. He fumed as he went.

He was angry, but it was the kind of anger that bubbled below the surface, ready to boil over at just the right moment. At just the right person.

The ever-present anger at the clan, for all they were, had been, and stood for.

At this Sombra, for nearly resulting in the death of his brother and doing who knows what to him. For threatening Satya.

Satya, who could have come to him for help. And who had the gall to threaten him after not trusting him.

At Gabriel Reyes. For being alive, and for using Hanzo as bait for McCree.

McCree.

McCree. For stepping up to the Reaper, and claiming to have done it for him. For his cursed grin. For his easy disregard towards the value of his life, to the effect his decisions would have on the rest of them.   

Hanzo forced himself to relax his hands. If he clenched them any tighter he would break skin. He stepped over debris towards a small postcard stand by a shop overlooking the bay. He let his fingers trace the frayed edges of cardstock, the bright colors of the buildings captured in photographs contrasting with the scene around him. Below the postcards were magnets, and even lower, bumper stickers. He picked a generic _‘Hecho en México’_ one and tucked it into the pouch at his hip. [7]

Behind him came a clattering sound, and Hanzo swiveled around with Storm Bow aimed.

 _“No, por favor!”_ [8] Cried the voice of a child. Hanzo cautiously lowered the bow and stepped forward.

Behind a tipped over food cart sat a boy no older than three, sniffling in a valiant attempt to keep quiet, and clutching a superhero figurine to his chest. He cowered back and scowled when he saw Hanzo, and Hanzo kneeled and held both hands up to show he meant no harm. The child responded by holding out his toy and pushing the button at its back to have it kick at him, no doubt in an effort to scare him off.

Hanzo bit at his bottom lip to hide his smile. The toy looked like a knock-off of Kamen Rider, and the kid’s ferocious expression reminded him of Genji. He used his index finger to playfully kick the toy back, and the child sat up and used the toy’s arms to punch Hanzo’s hand.

Hanzo let his hand fall in defeat, and the boy tried to go after it, but cried out in pain and fell back. Hanzo saw that the child’s ankle was twisted awkwardly, most likely broken.

 _“Dolor?”_ He asked, and the kid nodded. He reached up with his hands, asking to be held, and Hanzo marveled at his trusting nature before lifting him up gently to let him sit on his knee. But the jostling pained him, and he looked on the verge of loud tears, so Hanzo scrambled to distract him. [9]

 _“Chikusho. Eeto…”_ Hanzo wracked his brain to dredge up the meager Spanish lessons he had been given for anything that would help calm him. _“Como… como te... lames?”_ [10]

The boy hiccuped. He looked up at him and gave a watery little laugh. Inexplicably, he turned his head to the side and licked up the side of his tattoo, and Hanzo nearly dropped him in surprised disgust. He laughed again at the face that he made.

 _“Manuel,”_ he said, voice a little shaky. Hanzo blinked down at him.

 _“Manuel...ito?”_ Hanzo tried for the nickname tool he knew, and Manuel smiled at him. Hanzo scooped him up into the crook of his arm and walked back the way he came towards Mercy’s makeshift clinic and connected to her private line. “Dr. Ziegler, do you have space available in your clinic? I found a child with an ankle injury.”

“Any blood loss?” Mercy asked him, but Hanzo had a hard time paying attention, let alone answering, when the child perked up and started talking a mile a minute. He hastily told Mercy no, and she told him she’d clear some space for the child and begged him to be careful.

He thanked her, then looked down to where the kid was walking his little toy over his shoulder.

 _“Mi papa tiene tatuajes como los tuyos pero los de él brillan cuando esta obscuro! Me gusta dormir con el porque así no me da miedo!”_ [11]

 _“Zenzen wakarahen.”_ he sighed. [12]  

Manuel imitated him, and then an explosion went off nearby, nearly knocking him off balance. Hanzo hastened to switch to the main line and caught the end of McCree’s report just as Manuel started to cry.

“-found the Junkers’ old tunnel. A few Talon agents squatting, Reaper sighted. They set off a dinky little homemade bomb, but our shields took most of it, and they ran off. We’re in pursuit. I’m goin’ down _Calle Diaz_ if anyone’s in-”

Hanzo didn’t manage to catch the rest, Manuel’s wailing in his opposite ear was giving him a headache and he was only looking to get worse.

“No. No no no. _Yamete. Yamete kudasai.”_ He plead with the toddler uselessly, only causing him to scream louder. Hanzo pulled a knife from his belt for defense while trying to get the child to quit wailing. [13]

He jogged forward to get to Mercy quicker, but stopped before an intersection when he heard the sound of footsteps running towards them. He jumped back when a man came into view, and raised his gun to aim at him. The movement was followed by the flash of a gunshot, and Hanzo twisted to shield the child as the man fell to the ground. The sound of spurs echoed in the narrow street he’d come from, and then McCree stepped out too. There was blood splattered over his chestplate, and all of Hanzo’s anger came rushing back.

“McCree.” Hanzo put away the knife and stepped forward, “Are you-?”

“It ain’t mine.” Jesse told him. He nodded down at the body. “That’s one of the last of ‘em, and Reyes gave us the slip.”

“What of Fawkes and Rutledge?”

“Headed to Oaxaca, accordin’ to Miss Athena. Dunno when they’ll resume communication.”

McCree hadn’t looked at him once. So Hanzo leaned in, ignoring the squalling child in his arms to look up beneath the brim of his hat to look at him.

A bitter grimace marred Jesse’s usually cheerful face. Gone were the warm eyes and the cocky grin, replaced with a scowl and a look that didn’t do justice to his age. But the expression disappeared when he saw Manuel fidgeting in Hanzo’s arms, trying to free himself.

“Well lookie here, who’s this?” He said in that calm, level, friendly voice that had roped Hanzo in so long ago.

“Manuel.” Hanzo supplied, and then he supplied the child when McCree’s arms went up in an offer to take him. Hands free, he took Storm Bow from his back just in case. “Watch his leg. I’m taking him to Mercy.”

Manuel passed into Jesse’s arms with a lot of protest, screaming all the louder when Hanzo pried his clinging hands from his _gi._ By unspoken agreement, Hanzo pressed forward, and McCree fell into step beside him. He repositioned his sarape with one hand to cover the blood on his chest and cocoon the child in its wool. He made shushing noises and bent closer to the boy’s face, smiling gently.

 _“Hola Manuelito! Dime, te ha tratado bien este arquero corajudo?”_ [14]

The boy stopped crying. He looked up at McCree suspiciously, then made a move for his hat. He sniffed at him when Jesse pulled back to keep it safe, then began his wailing anew. Jesse winced.

 _“Oye no seas berrinchudo, Manuelin!”_ When his scolding only heightened the volume of his ear-splitting cry, Jesse pulled a face and looked to Hanzo, who only raised his eyebrows without pity. [15]

 _“Esta bien, esta bien, toma!”_ He took the hat and plopped it on Manuel’s head, who cooed happily immediately and used his toy as a pretend gun. [16]  

The pair were alerted by Athena that the authorities had detained the last of the nest of Talon agents. They’d been found taken out of commission in a pile at the end of an alley. Manuel inevitably resumed his crying, and Hanzo rushed forward to take the lead to avoid having it right in his ear. Jesse made shushing noises to no avail, and Hanzo had half a mind to contact Mercy and ask if she could meet them halfway when he heard Jesse start humming a bouncy tune instead. The cries tapered off after a minute. A higher pitched voice joined in, and then Manuel started singing happily.    

 _“En la ratonera ha caido un ratón!”_ He sang. It drew a laugh out of McCree. [17]

“Damn, and here I thought it’d be too old for you!” Jesse said, delighted, and he sang the next part back to him. _“Con sus dos pistolas y su traje de cowboy!”_

Hanzo turned to look over his shoulder just in time to see Manuel use his toy hero to headbutt McCree’s nose. _“Ha de ser gringuito porque siempre habla inglés!”_ At that, Jesse sputtered an offended, “Hey!”

Hanzo felt warmth settle in his chest when the two formed a chorus to sing, _“A más de ser güerito y tener grandes los pies!”_

Despite the levity of their interaction, Hanzo took another step forward and felt the warmth drain away, followed by the dragons’ unrest. Someone was watching.

He stopped in his tracks, and held out a hand to stop McCree as well.

 _“El ratón vaquero sacó sus pistolas, se inclinó el sombrero, y me dijo a solas-_ ” Manuel’s song was cut short by Jesse’s gloved hand covering his mouth.

 _“Hay que estar callados un momentito._ Hanzo, what…?” Jesse’s question tapered off when Hanzo turned and aimed behind them just as someone dropped from a roof. [18]

Manuel gasped and twisted in McCree’s arms. His hand went up in a friendly wave. _“El Soldado! Hola Señor Soldado!”_ [19]

“Jack.” Jesse greeted coldly. Hanzo didn’t bring down the bow.

Soldier 76. He looked worse for wear. There was a bloody gash on his temple and his jacket was scuffed. His shoulders sagged slightly in at the landing, but he rose to his full height and squared them back. He stared at Jesse without speaking, but Jesse didn’t seem perturbed.

“And where’d you get off to?” He asked.

“Putting a plan in place to undo the harm you would’ve caused if you had let those ziggurats go online. I won’t have to use it now.” The Soldier responded. His voice matched the rest of him.  

“That don’t explain why y’look like somethin’ the cat dragged in, Morrison.” Jesse used his free hand to once again reach back and tip Hanzo’s bow down. Hanzo used his bow to knock back his hand and Jesse turned to shoot him a look. The soldier looked between them.

“He slipped away, but he was angry. You told him no.” He said, and interrupted Hanzo’s attempt to tell Jesse to keep his hands to himself. There was little question to whom he was referring.

Jesse looked back around and adjusted his hold on Manuel, who was walking his toy around the brim of Jesse’s hat. “I told ya, I wouldn’t look good in one of ‘em helmets. It’s the hat for me.”

76 nodded down at Manuel and the hat he wore on his head.

“Forget that,” Jesse waved him off. His brow furrowed. “You really expected me to say yes?” He bit out, sounding hurt.

“Yes.” The Soldier answered, curt and honest. “And I apologize for doubting you.” He sounded sincere in that, at least. “But you left, Jesse. I didn’t know what trust to owe you.”

The accusation caused Jesse to suck in a breath. “I could say the same ‘bout you, Jack.”  

The soldier gave a short, quick exhale. Almost a laugh. “Always mouthing off, damn kid.”

Hanzo was tired of spectating. He nudged Jesse’s shin to get his attention. “If you two wish to continue your conversation then give me the child. Dr. Ziegler is waiting.”

“No.” 76 shook his head and shouldered his weapon. “I’m leaving. I just came to warn you, but you must already know. Reaper isn’t Reyes, McCree. He wants you, and if he can’t have you alive, he’ll want you dead. You’re a threat.”

“I know. And you ain’t comin’ back with us this time either, are ya?”

“Do you want me to?” The Soldier shot back, amused.

Jesse snorted. He took Manuel’s hand and lifted it off his shoulder to wave at 76. When he let go, Manuel kept waving by himself, and Jesse continued on to the clinic without another word. He picked up their singing again. Manuel’s voice joined back in. Jesse didn’t wait to see if Hanzo was following. He stood still, conscious that the Soldier’s attention had fallen on him.

“That kid needs someone on him to keep him from doing anything stupid. Can you do that, Shimada?”

Hanzo didn’t waste his breath asking how he knew him by name.

“You would do well to remember he is a grown man. I’m not his keeper, and I neither have nor want any part in this.” He said instead, and followed McCree to the clinic.

Mercy healed Manuel’s ankle with a quick zap from her staff, Jesse took back his hat, and some volunteers took him to a group of other children waiting to be identified and their families contacted. Manuel waved his action figure’s arm at Hanzo and Jesse, and they both waved back with smiles that didn’t quite reach their eyes. Dr. Ziegler finished off a few patients and reminded them their departure time was drawing near.

Right on time, they all made it to the LumériCo facility just outside of the city where they’d left their carrier. Fareeha fell in with Jesse and Dr. Ziegler when they arrived together, and Hanzo stood a ways from them, searching the area for signs of Satya.

“Don’t see your architech anywhere.” McCree remarked softly, letting the women go on ahead to the transport. Hanzo quickened his step, but he couldn’t help but turn to walk backwards as they made their way as a unit to the awaiting Orca. As if he expected to see her approaching from the horizon.

Pharah stepped up to lower the loading door. She gasped, and Hanzo turned to see what was wrong.  

Sitting atop a crate just inside was Satya. When she glanced up from the tablet in her hands and found them all looking at her, she calmly closed the screen, set it on her lap, and held out both her wrists.

* * *

 

No one bothered with cuffs, and Hanzo wasn’t sure he would have let them if they’d tried. He sat with Satya on a lowered bunk, where she had fallen asleep tipped over with her head nearly on his lap. He diligently braided her hair, knowing how much she disliked having it loose in her sleep. The motions should have been soothing, calming. Hanzo wanted nothing other than to sleep. But across the transport McCree sat with Mercy in a similar arrangement, and their quiet conversation quickly became heated.

Mercy refused to elaborate on what the Reaper had hinted at, and Jesse was trying his best to keep his anger tucked away, but the harshness of his voice betrayed him.

“He told me to ask you, Angie. So I’m askin’ you. What the hell is he?”

“I don’t know, Jesse! I really, truly don’t!” The doctor sounded distressed. A very specific kind of distressed. Hanzo’s eyes left the braid in his hands, went to McCree, and saw that he wasn’t buying her words either. “You know Gabriel was the only one we were able to recover from the blast. I examined the body myself! He was dead!”

“But that was him! How could he be dead and that _thing_ at the same time? He sounded like he was tryin’ to put the blame on you, Doc. Why?”

“I can’t say that I know,”

“Mission ain’t over ‘til we land at base, Agent Mercy. I’m orderin’ you to tell me what the hell he meant.”

“I can’t.”

McCree pulled away and gave her that hard look that seemed to live on his face now. He nodded, and Angela went off to the cockpit to sit with Fareeha.

Hanzo finished the braid and pulled the sash from atop his head to tie the ends of it together. He carefully slipped off the bunk and went to stand over McCree. He was fidgeting with his lighter, and Hanzo frowned at the bold ‘No Smoking’ sign pasted above the window behind him.

“What do you know?”

McCree tipped back his hat to meet his eye. He scratched at his beard. “You know Angie. Stickler for the rules. The fact she’s refusin’ to tell me even after a direct order means there’s someone above me that’s ordered her not to talk.”

Hanzo swallowed his lingering irritation and offered to stay. McCree politely refused him. He went back to Satya and left it at that.

* * *

 

Fareeha let them fly on autopilot for a stretch, but woke up a few hours before landing. In Gibraltar, the clock was approaching midday. They landed at the dock and were greeted by a harried looking Winston and a melancholy Lena. He apologetically ordered them all to the briefing room, and the team followed him trying not to drag their feet the whole way there. Tracer zipped away somewhere.

Genji, Zenyatta, and Lúcio were waiting by the doors to the main base just inside the warehouse. The lights on Zenyatta’s forehead flickered at their approach, and he gently nudged at the men slumped over at both his sides. When he got closer, Hanzo saw Lúcio was rubbing sleep from his eyes, and Genji was rolling his shoulders the way he did upon waking.

“No one got any sleep here either, did they?” Fareeha asked. Zenyatta stood, then hovered and folded his legs in together. He moved to follow at Dr. Ziegler’s side. The pair he left behind groggily stood up, and Genji latched onto Hanzo when he passed.  

“This has been a stressful revelation for all.” Zenyatta said, hovertech straining a bit to keep pace with Ziegler’s brisk walk.

“Mei took on damage control.” Genji added, keeping stride effortlessly.

“They wouldn’t let us at the reporters.” Lúcio said mid-yawn. He had to jog to keep up.

“How are you?” Hanzo asked his brother in a hush. Genji patted his back.

“I’m fine, _nī-chan._ You stole my question. Jesse said you fought Reaper?”

Hanzo scoffed. “To say I fought him is generous. He used me as bait and pushed me off a building. I’m fine.” He rushed to continue before Genji exploded in questions after his health. “I found the one responsible for what was done to you in Siberia.”

“Did you kill them?” Genji asked, already anticipating a positive answer. Hanzo hated to let him down.

“No. But I will.” He promised as they filed into the briefing room. Mei stood at the head of the table arguing in rapid-fire Mandarin with someone on a holo pulled from Athena’s console. Snowball hovered above her shoulder. Winston went to stand beside her, mostly to offer support. Mei ended the call, and her gaze swept their lineup. She lingered on Satya, the look on her face one of pure disappointment. Hanzo saw her cringe beside him, but he offered no comfort.  

“That was Lucheng.” She informed them. “A job offer, actually. On the moon. I had to break the news we’re…”

“Grounded. By the UN. We’re grounded.” Winston huffed. Quieter, he added, “I haven’t been grounded since the moon.”

Lena popped into the room with a tray precariously full of teacups.

“Figure’d we’d need it. What’re you lot standing around for? Sit, sit!”

She went around messily plopping the cups in front of all of them at their seats. Genji didn’t bother taking his mask off, he simply pushed his cup in Hanzo’s direction. Lena had spilled so much, Hanzo could empty Genji’s cup into his own with room to spare.

“Reinhardt’s been locked up in his room.” She said conversationally as she made her way around the long table. “Torbjörn tried talking him out, but he’s not doing so well either. He’s with Bastion in the garden, so he’s not alone. But Reinhardt… well… uh… I don’t know who’s been up to see him.”

“Zarya went up earlier.” Mei said. “She told me they’re marathoning reality shows.”

Something in her voice made Hanzo stare, and Mei reddened a bit and pulled Snowball into her lap.

“Okay…” Winston sighed. He took the spot next to Mei at the head of the table, but didn’t sit. “I guess… first thing’s first. Vishkar has gotten into contact with the UN, and I understand they’ve spoken to you as well, Agent Symmetra?”

“They have.” She confirmed. Hanzo swiftly turned his head to look at her. She sat still, poised, with her hands gracefully clasped on her thighs.

“So you know you’ve been placed under house arrest until it’s agreed what further disciplinary action to take against you?”

“Yes.”

“Then you are dismissed. Athena will keep track of your movements within the base and will set off all alarms and precautions should you attempt to leave or block her with your headset again. Unless you have anything else to report?”

Satya shook her head and promptly stood and abandoned her seat. Her braid swung when she stood, and Hanzo’s scarf tied at the end brushed his shoulder when she walked off to the exit. Winston waited for the swish of the door closing to go on.

“McCree. I’ve read your report. Thank you for submitting it so quickly. We’ve forwarded it to Geneva, and the council assigned to the old Overwatch has gathered in light of… your discoveries.”

“Just say Jack and Gabe, Winston. They’re not here to bite you.”

“Yes, well…” He coughed and re-adjusted his glasses. “They’ve scheduled your interviews in two days’ time. Everyone on the mission who interacted with either Morrison or Reyes will be spoken to separately. I’ve scheduled the meetings into your handhelds.”

There was a hum of understanding from the agents. Lena drummed her nails against the table with increasing frequency until she groaned and bumped Winston’s shoulder.

“What about permission to look for them, big guy? Jack, at least! You said you would ask! Does grounded mean we’re not allowed to find them?”

“Yes, well, uh…. Yes.” He nervously shot glances down the table. “We’ve been forbidden from seeking them out, yes.”

“What!?” Lena burst out in disbelief. Hanzo sipped at his lukewarm and over sweetened tea.

Mei was next. “They didn’t give us a definitive period, and now they expect us to stand down?”

“Wait, we’ve been suspended indefinitely?” Fareeha stood quickly and her chair went rolling off behind her. Tensions rose around her.

“I do not see an issue with the UN’s decision. Reaper is too dangerous to approach-” Mercy was cut off by McCree.

“Shouldn’t we be discussin’ this with Torbjörn and Reinhardt?”  

Genji backed him up. “Yes! I’m sure they would both agree with Mei. This is ridiculous! Who are they to stop us?”

“Our employers.” Hanzo muttered, and Genji shot him a dirty look despite the mask.

“It would be unwise to defy the United Nations openly.” Zenyatta murmured quietly to his right, but Lena overheard.

“Blast the UN! We need to find them. We deserve to know-” Lena choked off mid-sentence. She brought her hand up to cover her mouth and her image flickered, like she’d just aborted a blink.

“Lena…” Angela rose from her seat to go to her, but Lena held up a hand to stop her.

“No. No, Angie. We can’t just sit here. I need to know how.” Lena held her head high, and Hanzo admired the way she spoke clearly despite the tears pooling in her eyes. “And I’m not bloody well joking, Winston! How?! How could they do this?! First Amélie, then Jack, now Gabriel?! If they’re alive, why aren’t they with us? Why didn’t they trust us?” Lena yelled as she cried. Winston looked to her, expression just as pained and confused. He held out a large hand and Lena pushed it aside to fall against his chest.  

She sobbed what they were all likely thinking into his plasticoid armor. “If they’re not here, what are we doing, Winston? Why are we here? What good are we doing?”

Angela abandoned her seat. She pulled Fareeha from hers, and Mei reached over to rub Lena’s back. Zenyatta floated to them. Across from them, Jesse nodded at Genji, and Genji pulled at Hanzo’s sleeve to lead him over to where everyone was gathering in a supportive mass around their pilot and commander.

The archer that had been recruited barely half a year before had no business being witness to the senior agents’ pain. He felt his discomfort mirrored slightly by Lúcio, but he was busy kneeling next to Lena whispering platitudes. She sniffled and quieted, but she didn’t go back to her seat. None of them did. Genji crouched in front of Hanzo, and McCree straightened up to stand beside him. Wordlessly, he reached out and threaded their fingers together. Hanzo looked up, but McCree didn’t meet his gaze. His hand was shaking. Hanzo stepped closer.

Angela broke the silence.  

“I’m not… I’m not suggesting we defy the UN’s direct orders. I maintain that Reaper is too dangerous to seek out, and if Jack managed to avoid the authorities as 76 this long…”

“He ain’t gonna make it easy.” Jesse finished for her with a sigh. “Angie, I told you he’s-”

“Let me finish.” She pleaded calmly. “I want to know too, Lena. There is… research. Research I no longer have access to, classified and buried on the eve of our shutdown. It may help us, at least where Reaper’s concerned. If I can understand what he is, we can weaken him and bring him in. Mei, you searched the abandoned Watchpoints. Qufu held the medical department’s records. Is there any chance we could recover certain files?”

Mei frowned. “Maybe. I don’t know. We would have to go and look, and I don’t think the UN would like us poking around old Watchpoints.”

“South Korean Army’s still fighting that omnic in the middle of the East China Sea.” Everyone in the room turned their heads to watch Torbjörn walk into the room, followed by Reinhardt and Zarya. Ganymede flitted into the room, and Bastion poked her head into the doorway, but her size kept her from entering.

“Ah, I see we have missed a team building exercise!” Reinhardt said, his voice bombastic but lacking in cheer. “Is this a cuddle session? Why, Athena! You should have let me know!”

“It is shame.” Zarya walked over to stand behind Mei, and Hanzo lifted an eyebrow at the tentative smile both women gave each other. “He gives good hugs! Like big Siberian bear!”

“It was not scheduled.” said Athena. “And I would have had to interrupt your cooking show marathon.”    

“Ah, well then.” Reinhardt forgave her, and Torbjörn cleared his throat. His handheld was clamped in his prosthetic claw, and he scrolled down the news with his finger.

“So you need an excuse to go to Qufu. Qingdao got hit last week, and this one is looking very ugly.” He glared at his little screen and the video of a fight with a monstrous omnic rising from the sea. “Very ugly. MEKA is doing damage control, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they can’t contain it.”

“They won’t refuse aid.” Hanzo said to speed things along.

“And they’d be crazy to refuse Dr. Angela Ziegler.” McCree agreed. Angela frowned.

“I suppose… I could petition the UN for permission and bring Mei as an assistant… Yes.” She looked around at them, a regretful expression clouding her face. “It is the least I can do to make up for… for everything. Maybe if I had done something different, back then…”   

“Angela…” Reinhardt reached a large hand to ruffle her hair. “You must not place the blame on yourself. We all saw them falling apart, and we did nothing. I myself-”

“No, Reinhardt. You must not blame yourself. No one can hold anything against you after Ana-” Angela cut herself off and cast a worried look at Fareeha.

She simply shook her head and offered, “She didn’t want to worry me, but I could see it too.”

“You can’t go beatin’ yourself up too much, Angie.” Jesse cut in. He leaned into Hanzo against the wall. “You did your best, with both of ‘em. Not your fault Gabe’s stubborner than a mule.” Jesse spoke of a time long past gone, his voice tired and far away. “You tried, I remember you did. You tried reachin’ out to him, which is a fat load better’n what I did.”

Suddenly, Jesse’s hand tightened around Hanzo’s, like he had said something he hadn’t meant to. Angela stiffened, then forced herself to relax. “Jesse-”

“Naw, darlin’. This’s about you, ‘pologies for turnin’ it around there for a second.”

“Jesse, you never talk about… about why you left. You-”

Hanzo felt McCree’s hand squeeze his, then go lax. He let go and opened his arms to their medic. He smiled and jokingly said, “C’mon Angie. Angie, Angie. C’mere.”

She went and muttered an irritable, muffled little, “I’m not letting this go, Jesse,” into his chest. He squeezed her too tightly and she squeaked in protest, causing a ripple of laughter to go around the room.  

They hadn’t been there for very long, but even so, the scene felt like it was missing the Junkers.

Angela pushed off his chest and after a little tussle, Jesse let her go. She went to Winston to discuss how to go about her plan, and Winston called the meeting to an end and promised to catch them all separately for individual concerns, but nobody left. Lena and Winston fell in a heap against the wall next to them with Mercy and Mei standing in front of them with their arms crossed. Reinhardt pulled Zarya and Genji into a conversation about baking techniques that migrated over to the doorway so Bastion could listen in. Lúcio, Zenyatta, and Fareeha went to Torbjörn to check on the news from Shandong.  

Jesse took out his lighter and ignored Mercy’s sniff of disapproval when he pulled a cigarillo from the pocket beneath his chestplate. A spark lit in the middle of the room, and for once Winston didn’t say a word about having to clean the air filters. He supposed everyone knew better than to forbid the man his vice when it was the only comfort he had on hand.

Hanzo watched Jesse close his eyes and breath in deep, dragging smoke into the cave of his mouth. His lips parted, and he let it spill from his mouth, drift through the air beside him in swirling curls. Not unlike the dragons curled around his arm. Quiet, and weighted by fear and rage and...something all too familiar for Hanzo to see reflected back at him on Jesse’s handsome face. He knew that look on an intimately personal level. He knew how it felt to be lost.

Not unlike a dragon at all.

“McCree?” Hanzo stepped up to him just as Jesse let out another exhale. Another trail of white smoke. He squinted against the sting of it when it drifted too close to his eyes and missed the moment when Jesse’s eyes opened. They settled on him, and fixated on the smoke curling around his cheek.

Hanzo watched, from not even a footstep away, as whatever string that had been holding Jesse McCree together snapped.

It happened too quickly for Hanzo to do anything. He was close enough to see the way Jesse’s pupils dilated and his breath went shallow. Peacekeeper left its holster. A robotic hand grabbed onto his arm and yanked him aside just as the revolver’s safety clicked off.

The quick, snappy movement drew the attention of everyone in the room, and the gun pointing at seemingly nothing made sure all eyes stayed on them. A few dove for cover behind the conference table, shouting in alarm. Hanzo watched Jesse’s gaze flicker over their teammates, not really seeing them. The cigarillo fell from his lips, and he didn’t seem to notice. His arm was steady even as the rest of him trembled.

Panic attacks weren’t foreign to Hanzo. He had simply had his on his own. But Fareeha’s reaction and the swiftness of McCree’s response in Dorado made him think that they had that in common, once upon a time.

At his side, Hanzo considered how to best incapacitate him if it came to that. In a low, even voice he hoped was calm, he whispered, “Jesse. You’re holding onto my arm. It is your prosthetic, so perhaps you do not feel it, but I do. It hurts. I need you to let go. There is nothing to fear, here. We are safe.”

His grip loosened, but only by a bit.   

Fareeha inched closer, ignoring Angela’s warning looks. Everyone else was frozen, staring.

Hanzo tried again. “Jesse, lower the gun. We are safe. You are safe. Do you know where you are?”

He didn’t answer. Hanzo saw a line of smoke trailing from where the cigarillo had dropped. Jesse seemed to be seeing only that, and understanding dawned on him. Hanzo reached a foot out to stub the embers. He tentatively reached up to put a hand on his shoulder.

“Jesse, I am _fine._ The Reaper isn’t here. We’re safe. Do you know where you are?”

He got silence, for a beat or two. Then-

“Watchpoint.” The bitten out word doused Hanzo with relief.

“Which one?” Fareeha called out softly.

“Watchpoint Gibraltar.”

“Year?” Fareeha prompted. Jesse opened his mouth. He looked at the gun at his hand in horror, clicked the safety and shoved it back in its holster. He ignored the audience and followed the line of his other arm to where it was still squeezing Hanzo’s arm, and let go as if burned.  

“2.. 2070… Sorry. Sorry, sweetheart. Didn’t mean to scare ya. Don’t know what came-”

“Jesse-” Hanzo tried reaching for his hand, but Jesse shrank back right into Fareeha. He startled when he found her at his back, and Hanzo watched.   

He watched him crumble, curling in on himself, and witnessed as the weight of reality fell on him at last. He took a step forward, and Jesse turned.  

“Jesse-”

He ran.

Before Hanzo could do more than take a single step, a hand wrapped around his shoulder and pushed him back as it propelled its owner forward. Angela dashed after Jesse, Fareeha right on her heels, and Hanzo hung back in his uncertainty.

The second their footsteps died away the meeting room exploded in sound. Hanzo hardly heard them.

* * *

 

Lunch was… uncomfortable, to say the least, even if Mei tried to ease the silence. Winston requested Hanzo meet him in the labs at 1600 for a brief update. Fareeha and Angela returned from the dorms looking frustrated and sad, and Fareeha went to the recycling to dump an empty bottle of whiskey. Both warned the rest to give McCree space, shooting Hanzo pointed looks.

They could have saved their glares. He knew the pull towards solitude after an experience such as that.

Hanzo went to collect his things from the transport, noting that someone had already taken McCree’s. He dropped them off in his room, but didn’t unpack. He showered, changed into his usual _gi_ and _hakama,_ then used his free time to go down to Satya’s room. She greeted him at her door as if nothing were out of the ordinary, and Hanzo would’ve been grateful for it if not for the matter he had gone to discuss.

“You asked her after what she meant about Siberia.” He said, not asked.

Satya sighed and stood to the side to let him in. “I gave everything to Winston in my report. Surely you thought to ask him or Athena?”

“The thought occurred, but still I chose to come. Now will you humor me, or do you have any other pressing matters to attend to?”

Satya glared, but offered him the seat at her desk while she took the bed. He opted to stand by it instead. She looked to the chair, and Hanzo grunted and sat down. She only waited a few seconds to launch into her explanation.

“Sombra was ordered to infect Genji with the God Program stolen from Helix to see if a cyborg could be turned just as omnics, to see if their programming would betray them in cases as severe as your brother’s. Talon has agents that could benefit from undergoing a transformation similar to Genji’s, and Talon was looking to pinpoint any weaknesses before they went ahead and performed their own operations.”

“And did it?” Hanzo asked, horrified despite Mercy, Lúcio, and Zenyatta’s assurances that Genji was fine. Satya shook her head.

“No. It would render him inoperational, but it wouldn’t infect a cyborg like it could an omnic. Sombra merely had to download his specs to see for herself, and she only slowed his non-vital systems for show. She is the one tasked with overseeing their God Program. She attempted to defend herself by saying that it wasn’t her fault Zaryanova refused to treat him as an equal.”

Hanzo took the information silently. He didn’t comment on Sombra’s message. Instead he studied Satya’s face. She hadn’t undone the braid. His scarf remained tied to it.

“You could have trusted me.” He couldn’t help but bite out.

“I know. Now, I know.” She sighed again and stared out her window. “But in the face of everything I knew falling apart, I chose only to trust myself. I hope you’ll forgive me.”

And that was the best apology he would get out of her. He accepted it and stood up to leave.

Winston didn’t mind that he arrived for their meeting a few minutes early. He distractedly greeted him and closed a few screens over his desk, then shuffled around in his tire to face him as he entered.

“How is Satya?” He asked, the voice of a friend that was tired of putting up a harsh front. Hanzo didn’t suggest he go see for himself.

“I don’t think she regrets her actions. She only regrets the consequences, and that she saw no other way. Has McCree…?”

Winston frowned and shook his head.

Hanzo took Mei’s empty seat at her desk and sat. “You wished to speak to me?”

“Ah, yes. Did you check your video call appointment?”

Hanzo nodded. The action left him slightly lightheaded. He very desperately needed sleep.

“Good. Then there’s something else you need to know. I told Genji about it already, but I’m not sure if he’s informed you…”

“What is it?”

“The Watchpoint in Hanamura. We’ve nearly completed repairs, but the UN has pulled their people and I’m afraid it will fall vulnerable to the Shimada-gumi’s competition. Athena has pulled reports of activity by the...uh, the Yamaguchi family in police reports. Please excuse my pronunciation.”

Hanzo waved away his concern, then froze for a second, recognizing the mannerism as McCree’s.

Winston paid no notice. “We need to stake a claim to it, or at least sabotage the Yamaguchi’s attempts, but it can’t be official now that we’ve suspended activity- ah! Agent Genji!”

His brother appeared silently in the doorway of the labs. “You’re speaking of Hanamura?”

“Yes.” said Hanzo. “When did you plan on telling me?”

“At a better time, brother.” He strode forward. “I suppose now is good enough. But first-” He let out a sigh. “Winston, I just heard from Zenyatta. If he is going to Nepal-”

“What is happening in Nepal?” Hanzo interrupted, ignoring the dull pain growing at the base of his skull.

Winston seemed to sympathize with his headache. He took off his glasses and shined them against his fur. “Zenyatta got word from a colleague in the Shambali. They’ve been contacted by a… questionable party we suspect is a cover for Talon. I… assumed you two would prefer to take the job in Japan as a pair. I offered to send someone with Zenyatta to Nepal, no official sanction of course, it would be filed as a vacation-”

“Who will you send with him?” Genji asked.

“I was going to offer it out tomorrow at breakfast...”

“You will.” Hanzo said. Both Winston and Genji stared. Winston, confusedly.

“Me!?”

“No, Genji.” Hanzo couldn’t help but smile a little at the befuddled expression on the gorilla’s face. At his answer, he brightened and muttered, “Ah!”

Genji cocked his head to the side. “And who will you take to Hanamura?”

“I can handle it on my own.” He said decisively. Winston looked to Genji expecting him to argue, but Genji didn’t say a word.

After a minute, there was a buzz of static, then he said, “You can take McCree.”

Hanzo thought about it. The idea had its merits. McCree’s presence would improve the quality of the mission. But he knew Jesse was in no state to take on a mission in Japan. He knew he would want to go after Reyes.

So he shook his head. “I’m feeling nostalgic.” He said airily and stood, then nearly blacked out for an instant. He blinked sleep away and shook his head. “I will take a ‘vacation’ as well. November marks six months since I joined. The contract I signed entitles me to paid leave, does it not? When should I leave?”

Winston hummed. “As soon as you’re comfortable leaving, Agent. Speed is the priority, before the Yamaguchi gain a foothold in Hanamura.”

Hanzo hummed his understanding. His communicator buzzed in his pocket, and he opened it to a message from Mei begging for help in the kitchen. He convinced Genji to join them, and they left Winston to wade through endless emails marked ‘urgent’.   

* * *

 

The entire base did their best to go about the day as if it were business as usual. They filed into the dining hall, but the brothers didn’t sit with them. Genji, because he had been picking off chicken as Mei fried it, and Hanzo because the anxiety growing in the pit of his stomach didn’t leave much room for an appetite.  

So, it fell to the Shimada brothers to fetch their resident gunslinger for dinner, seeing as Athena wasn’t getting a response.

They didn’t have much better luck. After Genji’s initial disbelief that Hanzo didn’t already know McCree’s passcode and Hanzo’s explanation that the man changed it randomly out of habit, they brainstormed ways to force their way in.

“If we try really hard, we can probably break the door down.” Genji said, trying in vain to wedge one of his shuriken in the crack between the door and the wall. “I never had the patience for hacking keypads, and I can’t take them apart like he can. We can borrow Reinhardt’s hammer? Unleash the dragons?”

“Somehow I feel that would be detrimental to what we are trying to achieve.” Hanzo stood to his side, impatiently, and a little nervously, tapping his foot. Genji looked at his clawed toes pointedly, then huffed.

“He’s not going to come out, _nī-chan._ Maybe we should give him more time.”

“We have given him all day.” He kept his voice low, and Genji lowered his pitch to match him.

“We know better than most how wounds must be allowed time to heal, brother.”

“Yes but,” Hanzo cut off when there was the sound of movement beyond the door. So McCree was awake, at least. After a minute or so with no signs of the door about to be opened, he spoke up again. “He shouldn’t have to be alone.”

They kept at it, coming and going, but always together.  It wasn’t until the sun had long since set and Reinhardt passed them in flannel pajamas that Genji suggested they end their vigil and go to sleep. He got swept away by a passing Mei and Lúcio, and Hanzo was left alone in the empty hallway.

With his eyes out of focus, the yellow light from the halogens along the hallway almost looked like the strings of lights hanging above the plaza in Dorado.

He closed his eyes to blink, and when he reopened them, the effect was gone. But the image remained burned into the back of his eyelids. The sound of heels came down the hall. Hanzo knocked on the door at his back for what felt like the thousandth time.

“Jesse. Open the door.”

He acknowledged Angela with a nod as she walked past, eyes on McCree’s door and looking just as worried as he felt. She gave him a tight smile, a brief pat on the shoulder, then headed off in the direction of the rec room.

He was tired. He was still angry, but he consciously reminded himself that his anger didn’t take precedence. Mostly, he was worried. Mostly, he felt he owed it to McCree to be there. After all, the man had gone out of his way for him, even before they became friends.

Yes, McCree had been the one to call out his reaction to seeing his brother’s mutilated face for what it was. He had given him time, then gone to confiscate his alcohol. There was no way Fareeha found all of it. Jesse had unwittingly set up a formula, and now Hanzo was following it. There was little else he could do. He wasn’t accustomed to providing comfort.

He knocked again.

“I know you are in there, and I cannot do as you once did for me and force it open.”

Athena crackled in the hallway speakers. “I would have to report you.” She chimed in helpfully.

“Yes, thank you.” He responded, polite but exasperated. He turned around and pounded on the door with more urgency than before. “Jesse!”

A door. After everything, a door was to be his barrier.

He could always fall asleep against it. He had slept in worse places. He didn’t much care about any opinions his teammates might have.

Perhaps if he went out to the roof he could climb down and force the window open. Or, Hanzo reflected, he could go out and climb down, only to blink, pass out, and fall to his death.

That seemed to be happening a lot.   

He pressed his forehead against the door. “Jesse, please.”

He was reminded that McCree’s specialty was stealth when the sound of the lock being turned wasn’t preluded by the sound of spurs. Hanzo took a quick step back before he could tumble forward onto the cowboy behind the newly opened door. His feet were bare. He looked up to take in McCree’s state. He expected bloodshot eyes, the sharp stench of alcohol. A haggard and beaten appearance, granted everything that had happened in the last 72 hours.

But Jesse seemed… tired. Exhausted from the mission, no doubt, but otherwise fine.

“Well hey there, sweetheart. What’re you doin’ round these parts?”

Hanzo frowned.

“I…” Now that he had gotten what he’d hoped for, he realized that the ability to comfort that seemed to come to the cowboy as a second nature was as out of reach to him as the Spanish language. Eyes studying McCree’s face closely for a sign of the despair he had caught a glimpse of before, he opened his mouth to try again. “I came here to-”

Metal fingers closed around his forearm, a ghost of the bruising force of earlier that day. The dragons painted beneath them shot out a cry of alarm when Hanzo was yanked forward and he tripped past the doorway of Jesse’s room.

“Jesse, what-” Interrupted, again. This time by a door slamming shut. A wall at his back, and a warm, trembling hand curving around the cut of his jaw.

On the other side of the barrier, Hanzo let out a muffled sound of surprise, head tilted back to allow for the kiss suddenly upon him. The hand at his arm relaxed and moved down to wrap around his waist and tug him against the cold, hard planes of bronze armor dented in places, bloody and scratched.

Jesse held Hanzo to him like a man drowning, grasping for a lifeline, taking Hanzo’s breath as if to regain his own. Panting in between moments when he stopped long enough to allow them to suck in a lungful of air.

He didn’t say a word. No whispered words of affection, no laughter chasing a softly murmured ‘ _sweetheart’_. There was nothing of Jesse in the kiss they were sharing, and his absence stung.

Hanzo pulled back and put his hand between them before Jesse could chase after. He waited for him to open his eyes. When he did, Hanzo moved his hand to smooth out what he could of Jesse’s beard.

He swallowed and asked, “Is this what you need?” He would almost be relieved if it was. Actions were easier than words, after all. Even actions such as these.

The question caught Jesse off guard. He blinked and tried to step away, but Hanzo shot his arm out to curve around his waist and hold him in place. He tipped his chin down to force him to look at him. The hair tucked behind his ear loosened and fell over his eyes.

Instead of answering, Jesse reached in between them to brush it back over his head. His fingers followed it to the tips, and he brought the ends of it to his lips. He pressed a kiss against the dark and silvery strands. Gentle. Affectionate.

“It’s gettin’ long…” He murmured. A half-smile tugged at his lips, and it took Hanzo everything not to surge up and kiss the corner of his mouth to coax it out. But it wasn’t genuine.

“Is this what do you need?” he asked again. Jesse let his hair fall and his hand went to push back his own.

“I… maybe. I don’t know. Shit, Hanzo, I don’t know, I-” He tugged at his _obi_ , but stopped, then opted to tug the sleeve of his _gi_ and pull it down and his arm out. His hand trailed over the right side of his chest, skimmed over his ribs, and his mouth followed after. Hanzo felt it press against the bullet wound scar. He kissed him there again. “I don’t know.”

Hanzo let him take his breath. He let his thick arms wrap around him, let his hands wander down to his thighs and lift. Allowed him pull them both away from the wall and found he didn’t dislike the sensation of being carried. Idly he wondered if he could return the favor.   

He expected for his back to hit the mattress, but instead McCree fumbled to kneel at the foot of his unmade bed and set him down at the end of it. His embrace was smothering. His lips moved from his mouth to his jaw, to the shell of his ear, to the pulse set against the side of his neck.

Warmth. He was warmth, but it was wrong.

Before Hanzo could push him off, a word spilled from his lips against his hair.

 _“Perdon.”_ [20]

Then again. That same word. Hanzo made a mental note to double his efforts towards learning Spanish.

 _“Perdon. Perdon, perdoname, cariño._ You’re not a- you deserve better than a…” [21]

“Jesse...” He placed his hands against his chest, but paused just before pushing. “Jesse, what-?”

The word fell like droplets, breathed into the crook of his neck. Like droplets pressing past eyelashes clamped tightly shut, smearing against skin, trickling down. Shoulders that shuddered as their arms held him. Droplets.    

Hanzo felt his stomach sink. The word fell against his skin like the tears, and he couldn’t bear to hear it.  

“Jesse, stop. Jesse, look at me.” He said, but Jesse shook his head vigorously and only held him all the tighter. Hanzo bit his lip and adjusted slightly so he could slide onto the floor too. Once he got there, he leaned against the bed and pulled McCree to him and adjusted him as if he were a doll for all the resistance he put up. He reached a hand up to card his fingers through his brown hair.

He listened to Jesse’s muffled gasps and felt helpless. He didn’t know what to say to fill the emptiness, or if there existed a combination of words capable of easing the pain. He turned his head and pressed a kiss to his hair simply because it felt like the correct course of action. He was out of his depth. He was-

“Guess I know what it feels like, now.”

The sound of his voice reached into his chest and brought nothing but pain.

“Kicker, ain’t it?” Jesse said, followed by a wet chuckle. “Seein’ someone you buried come back to haunt you. Ain’t got a clue how you went about it sweetheart, ‘cause I feel like I’m about to lose my goddamn mind.”

Hanzo took the invitation and ran with it.

“I’m not entirely convinced I kept mine, either.”

Jesse gave him a little questioning noise and spurred Hanzo on.

“I was the heir to a criminal empire. I killed without remorse, and ordered others to do it for me for convenience. I would have struck a deal with Talon and ground Overwatch into the dirt if it meant profit. I would have killed you without a second thought, and I murdered my own brother in cold blood. I was not a good man, and the brother I didn’t even have the stomach to see buried came back to-” Hanzo had to stop to take a steadying breath. “He came back to forgive me.”

“He loves you.” Jesse reminded him, because he was good, and he was everything Hanzo was not.

“Yes.” He laughed, marveling at the truth of that statement. Tears burned at his eyes, but he blinked them back. “Yes, and now I am here. An heir to a criminal empire, a mercenary, and a murderer employed by the United Nations to work alongside idealistic and genuinely well-meaning heroes. All because my brother came back from the dead to forgive me.”

Jesse lifted his head and pressed a kiss to his cheek.

“Furthermore, I would not be convinced I was still in possession of my head if you weren’t currently kissing it.”

That earned him three more kisses, and an honest breath of laughter. Hanzo buried his hand in his hair and held.  

“I’m not being haunted, Jesse. Not any longer.”

Jesse didn’t say anything for a very long time. Hanzo waited patiently, worrying more as each minute passed that he said something wrong, made everything worse somehow.

“Hanzo?” He whispered it so quietly that Hanzo nearly missed it in his fretting.

“Yes?”

“Why’re you here, Hanzo? Why’re you doin’ this?”

Hanzo opened his mouth, then closed it again. His fingers carded through Jesse’s hair on their own accord.

“I find… I find that you find comfort in something to fill the silence. I thought that I could… help.”

Jesse went silent again, then he breathed in deep and started to pull up from where he had buried his face into Hanzo’s neck. He was smiling.

“Not what I meant, but well! Ain’t you a sweetheart!” His tone almost resembled normal. He rolled off of Hanzo and stood up. “Ain’t it late? Y’should be goin’ to bed, darlin’, not wasting your time babysittin’ me. I’m fine, really. You can-”

“McCree!” He snapped. “Do not insult my intelligence and the bond we have formed in the same breath. I know you are not ‘fine’. Do not lie to me.”

That got his mouth to clamp shut. That lost expression crossed his face again, and he turned his back to him. Hanzo drew in a breath and softened his voice. He slowly pushed himself off the ground and stood as well. He tried again.

“You… you don’t need to lie to me. I will leave, if that is what you wish. I will fetch your si- I will fetch Fareeha, if that is what you wish. Or Dr. Ziegler, or Genji. Someone that has a better idea of the wrongs done to you by those men. Just tell me what you need.”

“I don’t want you to leave.”

Hanzo could take those words for what they seemed to be; a response to his suggestion. But something in the way Jesse said them made Hanzo wish desperately for the ability to see his face. He reached out and took hold of his hand and pulled. Hanzo led them both to sit against the headboard on the bed and it groaned beneath their weight. He systematically began undressing him. First the sarape, then the chestplate. He hummed with triumph when he successfully pulled his left sleeve from his prosthetic without aid.

“I am here, if you wish to speak.” He said, and pulled the belt from the loops at his waist and threw it off the bed. He laid back and Jesse settled his head over his heartbeat, and Hanzo’s hand went back to pet his hair. “About anything.”

 _“Ay, Hanzito._ You’ll be eatin’ your words. You know I can run my mouth.”

“I don’t mind.” Quieter, he admitted, “I’ve missed your voice.”

The cowboy made a small noise of wonder. He twisted and tangled their legs together, tucked his head beneath Hanzo’s chin. His breathing was slow and measured, Hanzo could feel the rise and fall of his chest. He went lax, and Hanzo assumed he’d succumbed to sleep, and closed his eyes to follow him there.

“I get them mixed up sometimes. In my head, y’know?” Jesse’s voice roused him before he could drift off. He made a quiet noise to show he was listening, thinking he meant Morrison and Reyes.

“Gabe, and my old man. Both of ‘em. The last I saw of them was their backs as they walked away from me. As they just....”

 _Left._ Hanzo could fill in the blank easily.

“...The war ate my dad up, and there I was, the scared angry kid it spit back out. Y’know what Deadlock promised me when I joined? A shot to kill the bastards that did my ma in. I told myself those would be the first and only lives I took. Wanted to be a mechanic, like her. Thought it’d be easy to get out.”

“Were they?” Hanzo interrupted. Jesse tipped his head up and stared, so he clarified. “Were they the first? The first lives you took?”

Jesse laughed, the sound of it wretched, like what Hanzo would let out in mourning for his own younger self if he had Jesse’s courage.   

“Naw. Naw, I shot a random kid ‘round my age that stumbled on a trade and saw too many faces. Boss wanted ‘im gone, and I was there to oblige. Was aimin’ for the head. Make it quick, y’know? Aim was shit, got his neck. Made a godawful sound just layin’ there, gaspin’ all wet and-”

“I can imagine.” It wasn’t that the description was affecting him, he had seen more than his share of cruel and senseless bloodshed. But he didn’t like the faraway look that had taken over Jesse’s eyes.

“You know how it goes. Drink enough and it keeps the dreams at bay.”

“...I resorted to such on occasion. Rare occasions. Usually, I was of the opinion that I deserved the nightmares, and so did little to deter them.”

“How’d you get any shut eye?” he asked feebly.

“I adjusted. I can manage alarmingly well on four hours.” At the moment he was managing on two.

“That ain’t healthy.” Jesse answered, as if he had room to talk.

“No.” Hanzo agreed. He thought over his words, but in the end decided to spit out the question. “You said Reyes was your commander in Blackwatch. But you consider him a father figure? How old were you when Blackwatch recruited you?”

Jesse snorted. He muttered “recruited,” as if it were a joke, then said, “You really ain’t asked Athena to pull up our files, Hanzo? You know you _do_ have access to that information.”

“I was barred from that information when I had interest in it when I newly joined. Now I have little use for it. Don’t change the subject.”

“Seventeen.”

Hanzo froze a little in shock. “A child.”

“A dumbass kid.” Jesse agreed.

“And this… Reyes. He was kind to you?” Hanzo wanted to understand.

“Yeah.” His voice strained, and for a second Hanzo thought he would cry again. “He was a lot of things, but at the base of it, yeah. We had our issues, ‘specially leadin’ up to the mess in Geneva, but… It don’t match up. Who he was then, and what Reaper is now. I always figured him out to be a different sort of ghost.”

“You speak as if you have more than one. Ghost, I mean.”

Jesse laughed, short and hollow. He tugged at Hanzo to make him lay on the bed properly and squashed against him to fit, but changed his mind and instead rolled on top of him and lay there with his chin propped on his chest.

“I could name ‘em, but I doubt you like the sound of my voice that much, _cariño._ ”

“You underestimate my fondness for it.”

Jesse grinned. “Flatterer.”

Hanzo smiled too. He draped an arm over his back and tucked the other behind his own head. Sleep seemed so far away. “Tell me about them.”

“Mostly it’s people I couldn’t save.” He explained softly. “Hero complex, Gabe called it. Tried pawning me off to Jack more than once, told me I was too good for what Blackwatch did. Got angry about it too. The last time he tried it I got up and left. Shouldn’t have.” His voice went down to a whisper. “I ain’t stupid. I knew he was up to somethin’. I left, but I didn’t go far. Didn’t count on Headquarters goin’ up in flames, though.”

Hanzo closed his eyes and listened quietly.

“Went on the run, and the only company I had were these ghosts.” He moved his head, and Hanzo felt the scrape of his beard as his cheek went to rest on his chest. “All these ghosts in my head. These voices,” His bangs draped over his face, strands poking out between his fingers as he ground the butt of his palm to his forehead, “...and ain’t none of ‘em a voice of reason.”

Hanzo felt a spark of memory. “Is that so?” He smiled, small and soft. He opened his eyes and looked down at him. “Well, gunslinger. It’s nice to meet you. My name is Reason. Reason Shimada.”

Jesse looked up at him, the frown on his lips tugging upwards as he recalled the same memory. Hanzo traced the curve of it with his thumb, then carried his hand up higher.

 _“Bān bān.”_ he whispered, index finger pressed against his sweaty temple, middle playing trigger, and a wrist flick to mimic recoil. [22]

He let his hand fall down to his back once more and continued seriously, “I cannot begin to attempt to act as a voice of reason if you do not talk to me, Jesse. Do not lie to me. That is all I ask.”

His _‘please’_ went unsaid.

Jesse hummed. He toyed with the end of Hanzo’s hair and commented quietly, “It really is gettin’ long…”

He fell asleep draped over Hanzo like a blanket. Hanzo stared at the ceiling until sleep took him too.

* * *

 

The next day Jesse avoided him if he tried bringing up their conversation, and Hanzo allowed it. To bare oneself so openly was not something someone like Jesse would readily like to admit to, and so he gave him time.

He took the news of Hanzo leaving for Japan well, and Hanzo didn’t know what to think when he saw a calculating look spark in his eye.

“Vacation, huh? Goin’ back to your roots… now that sounds mighty fine. Reckon my vacation days stacked up since before the fall?” He asked the table at breakfast, and got a wishful laugh out of Reinhardt and Torbjörn.

They had their interviews the next day, and Hanzo told their overseers of his wish to visit his family’s home. He only needed to remind them that even if the title read “Watchpoint Hanamura”, the property was still in his name to sway their decision to approve of his vacation spot.

Genji and Zenyatta finalized their own transportation details to the monastery in Nepal, and Hanzo went to hassle Genji into packing early before he kept them all awake the night before his departure hunting down some article he desperately needed to pack.

 _“Ne, okā-sama,”_ He wheedled at him after Hanzo threw a sweater with too much force at his face. He peeled it off and rolled it in a lazy fold and shoved it in his duffel. “I bet you’ve already packed, and you’re not even leaving for another week.” [23]

Hanzo told him that he hadn’t even _unpacked_ from the trip to Dorado. When he left his brother’s room, he wandered to his own to fix that, and pack for his own upcoming trip while he was at it.

His room had gathered dust. He spent his nights curled next to McCree in a bed not built for two. He wondered if something could be done about that.

 

_Why’re you here, Hanzo? Why’re you doing this?_

 

Why was it always Jesse’s words echoing in his head?

 

_My life’s yours._

 

He shook his head, scolded the dragons for their possessiveness.

 _“Dame.”_ He told them before they do more than peek out from beneath metaphorical bedcovers, and they quieted. [24]

Hanzo read over the illicit mission file Winston sent to his handheld and highlighted locations he would most need to avoid being spotted. Hanamura was small, so some sort of disguise would be necessary. After all, he had made it a habit of infiltrating the castle in his usual wear once every year, and crime rings talked.

He eyed the instrument case he’d left propped on the wall following their return from Dorado. Inside were his weapons, and his utility belt lay at the floor. He’d need to restock his arrows. He made a mental note to visit Mei the next morning in the labs to use her printer, and mourned the fact Satya would be unavailable to finalize their designs on arrows that utilized her hard light. He walked to the guitar case, sat cross-legged in front of it, and opened a pouch on his belt for his field tools when his fingers brushed against vinyl. He pulled out the sticker he had taken from the postcard stand in Dorado, and remembered the child he found after.

He remembered Jesse’s face when he laughed and sang with the boy.

Hanzo held out the sticker against the guitar case’s form, considering where to place it. He settled on sticking it beneath a decal he had of some old Japanese rock band. Then he reached for his duffel and set it atop his legs and began rifling through. He pulled out dirty clothes and threw them in an empty corner for washing. At the bottom of the duffel rested the electric razor Mei had given him to threaten Jesse with, and the memory brought a smirk to his lips. He set it aside to return it to her, but his fingers stilled against it when his hair fell over his eyes.

McCree had a point.

He returned the razor to the duffel and pulled his handheld from his sweatpants’ pocket.

 

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Hanzo Shimada:**

Mei, may I borrow the razor you sent with me to Dorado?

**(12:07)**

**[Agent: ZHOU, M.L.] メイちゃん:**

lol mei may

**(12:08)**

Yea :)

Wait what are you going to do with it? :0

**(12:09)**

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Hanzo Shimada:**

I’ll be taking it with me to Japan

**(12:09)**

......

**(12:10)**

I will send pictures.

**(12:11)**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jamie and Mako will be back, btw. Just sayin, don’t fret. Anyway, guess who cried writing this! Me! A record-setting four times! So either I’m a baby, it was the alcohol, or this really was bad and i’m sorry. 
> 
> Also! Do u guys wanna see something cool? Well not see, listen. Do y’all wanna listen to something cool??!?! This [lovely person](http://whostolethetaiyaki.tumblr.com) did a wonderful podfic/excerpt reading for the end of chapter 9 and u can listen [here](https://my.pcloud.com/publink/show?code=VZDjzvZECoU5ePjzfb5F5CnviFlHfsmOLR7) and cry with me because holy shit #blessed
> 
> Translations:  
> [1]I called you my son.  
> [2]And just where did my parrot go? You’re not even saying a peep!  
> [3]Alright then, I’ll go first. Here’s your answer, asshole;  
> [4]Come on out!  
> [5]Come on out, Jessito, Jessito. Come on out from there. (It’s a mexican nursery rhyme. It’s originally about a goat. And the devil….)  
> [6]What?!  
> [7]Made in Mexico  
> [8]No, please!  
> [9]Pain?  
> [10]Fuck, umm… How do… how you lick? (He was going for ‘llamas’ which would be ‘What is your name’)  
> [11]My dad has tattoos like yours but his glow in the dark! I like to sleep next to him because then I’m not afraid!  
> [12]I don’t understand you at all.  
> [13]Stop it. Stop, please.  
> [14]Hello Manuelito! Tell me, has the grouchy archer been treating you well?  
> [15]Hey now, don’t make a fuss, Manuelin!  
> [16]Fine, fine! Here!  
> [17]The whole nursery song goes: “A mouse has fallen into the mousetrap, with his two guns and his cowboy suit! He must be white, because he’s always speaking English! Apart from being pale and having big feet! The cowboy mouse took out his gun, tipped his hat, and told me-”  
> [18]We’ve gotta be quiet for a lil’ bit.  
> [19]The Soldier! Hello, Mr. Soldier!  
> [20]I’m sorry  
> [21]Sorry. I’m sorry, forgive me, sweetheart.  
> [22]Japanese gunshot sound effect  
> [23]Hey, mom-  
> [24]Stop it.  
>   
> hmu on tumblr [here](https://cantodelcolibri.tumblr.com) if u ever wanna like, yell me into productiveness cuz 8/10 i needa be yelled into productiveness  
> Thanks for reading!!!


	17. Half a Soul and a 15% Tip

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 17 chapters later and i change the title lol  
> So I haven’t updated since i started mass effect andromeda… well, 89 hours, 20 minutes, and 57 seconds later i’ve completed mass effect andromeda so here’s a chapter.
> 
> End notes have translations, and y’all’re gettin hover over kanji from now on cuz life came around to bite me in the ballsack and i cant keep on being confusing (but if u hate it and prefer i change the lot to kanji, pls let me know i need Opinions)

 

Eight months contained two hundred and forty-four days. There were one thousand eight hundred and twenty-five days in five years. Plus the leap year, the total came to one thousand eight hundred twenty-six. 

What was eight months compared to five years? 

He never talked about it. He didn’t much like the vulnerability that came with airing out the skeletons in the closet, or the ghosts in his head. But Jesse McCree was a man who had spent a not insignificant part of his life on the run, and men on the run developed habits. 

His took on the form of cracked jokes, silence muffled by amiable chatter, soundless spurs, hoarded food, a twitchy trigger finger, watchful eyes, and nights spent recovering from the dissonance between living and being alive with a bottle of whiskey and an overflowing ashtray.  

It took eight months to leave behind the man he’d been reduced to become. Eight months to remember how to be a human interacting with other humans after five years of self-imposed loneliness half-driven by an inclination towards freedom. 

It took less than one to fall back into old habits. 

Jesse sat slumped over the counter at a bar, the old wooden grain warm against his scruffy cheek. Angela was going to have another field day when they both made it back to Gibraltar and she saw the state he’d let himself fall in. But with no one around that mattered to see him, or more precisely, no well-meaning doctors around to push his buttons, he didn’t much feel inclined to gussy up for one measly night on the town.

Angela was gone. She and Mei left for the eastern coast of China a few weeks after their Dorado mission. Genji and Zenyatta went next, to defend their old monastery in Nepal from a dubious threat of artifact theft and smuggling. Hanzo went to deal with rising territory squabbles in Hanamura. The Junkers were still on the lam, Reinhardt tagged along with Torbjörn on his visit home, Lúcio was off wrapping up a tour, and Vaswani… Hell, he didn’t even know what her situation was. 

The base went quiet after their departures, their skeleton crew feeling ill-fit once again for such a huge base when they had finally begun to fill one floor’s worth of bunks. Overwatch’s suspension left a bad taste in Jesse’s mouth. A feeling obviously shared by all the old soldiers left in the WatchPoint. It was too reminiscent of the days before the fall, when Gabe was catatonic and Jack continued to turn a willful blind eye to the damage falling squarely on his second’s shoulders.  

Feeling too cooped up in a base too cavernous to feel confining, Jesse got Winston’s okay, bid Fareeha and the few left on base farewell, shot off an email to Geneva, and actually  _ bought _ a one-way ticket to the closest country to Mexico that didn’t have an active bounty out on his ass for his ties to Deadlock, Blackwatch, Gabriel Reyes, the fallout of Overwatch, and a dozen or more so crimes fabricated by the powers that be to ensure his position on the World’s Most Wanted list.

So, Jamaica. From there he dodged sensors and bribed a repairman to sneak onto a cruise ship docked and bound for Cancun. He trucked it through Campeche and Tabasco until arriving back in Veracruz. 

Following a friendly tip from back home, he kept an ear to the ground through the golden streets of Dorado and followed the whispers to a bar in lower Castillo infamous for its brand of clientele. Luckily, he fit right in. No one raised an eyebrow when he walked into Calaveras and settled himself on a barstool a ways across from a girl to order a shot of tequila from the barkeep. Not even a glance when he tossed it back and told the old man tending to the taps to simply toss him a bottle of the stuff and make both their lives easier.   

Jesse sat slumped over the counter at a bar, the old wooden grain warm against his scruffy cheek, one eye on the stained glass of the bar’s door and the other pressed shut against his mechanical arm.   

 

Eight months. 

 

Eight months into Overwatch’s recall, and Jesse McCree had finally felt at home again. Like their little operation had a real chance at making it, and maybe they weren’t fated to repeat the mistakes of their forefathers. Eight months to make peace with his decision to throw caution to the wind and lie and sneak and kill his way back to Watchpoint Gibraltar. Eight months. 

Winston’s call to action took him longer to respond to than he’d like to admit. He knew he was one of the early few to answer, Lena and Mei being the only two to beat him to the punch, but most of them only took as long as they had because they’d actually had something going on in their lives. Reinhardt and Bridgette rescued people hurting in the countryside, Torbjörn tried to right his wrongs, and Angela strove towards much the same. Genji was kept away by his studies with Zenyatta and his search for Hanzo. All Jesse’d had were aliases and bounty hunters to outrun while chasing other bounties himself. Side jobs under the guise of anonymity and pseudonyms easy to abandon in case anyone got too close and it came time to run.

Run. All he’d been doing since Gabe gave him the choice to was run and keep running, looking back just enough times to invite the ghosts that took up residence in his head. 

Eight months. Eight months weren’t enough to put those ghosts to rest, especially now that he knew two of them were alive and talking, fighting and killing and doing God knows what in a world that decided it could keep on spinning without them.    

_ He didn’t understand. _

But he had a feeling someone here did. 

The bell suspended over the swinging door of the bar jingled as a new patron walked in, the sound jarring Jesse from his melancholy. With them came the raucous sound of laughter and drunken revelry. McCree turned his head and openly watched an omnic enter, her paint job a bright neon pink that clashed terribly with the bar’s wooden decor. She and her human arm candy blended into the establishment’s atmosphere almost as well as the woman sitting on a bar stool a few feet from him, stirring her martini too casually to be sincere. At least Sombra’s choice of bright purple was otherwise muted by the black that made up the rest of her outfit. 

He was waiting for her to acknowledge him. She’d been the nosy and loud one, calling attention to herself and drawing his at the most inopportune times. Japan, Gibraltar. Hacking his phone, blackmailing Vaswani. She always made the first move, so he was waiting for her to follow up on her custom here too. Apparently she was waiting for him to do the same, judging by the subtle glances aimed his way. Either that or she somehow found the bedraggled wrangler look attractive, which he was nowhere near vain enough to even entertain as a possibility. 

He doubted even Hanzo would want to speak to him looking the way he did at present, and he wouldn’t really blame the guy. 

His phone buzzed in his pocket, and like a fool his heart jumped a bit at that, wishfully hoping the message notification would read Hanzo’s name, but one fumble for his back pocket later revealed a text from an excited Mei-Ling Zhou.

 

**[Agent: ZHOU, M.L.] Mei:**

:0000 

!!!!!!!

**(00:17)**

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Ratón Vaquero:**

???

**(00:19)**

**[Agent: ZHOU, M.L.] Mei:**

Have you seen?!?!?!?!!??!?! 

**(00:20)**

 

A thousand things came to mind, among them MEKA’s recent battle against the enormous omnic off the shores of the Yellow Sea, or Lúcio’s appearance in the news at some charity event. Maybe there was the progress on Geneva’s ongoing debate on amending the Petras Act, or the security fiasco in Numbani. Or… there was Greece, but he didn’t see what about a bunch of statues could have their climatologist so excited. Maybe it was the Shimada brothers’ radio silence finally coming to an end. A recent post on Athena’s chat servers assured that at least Genji Shimada was off being himself somewhere in the Himalayas, doing his katas on a peak against the backdrop of a sunrise with Zenyatta’s orbs floating just out of focus. 

But since none of those things seemed too likely, he typed out a reply.

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Ratón Vaquero:**

Darlin you’re gunna have to be specific

**(23:21)**

**[Agent: ZHOU, M.L.] Mei:**

ok neither has Genji so this is on purpose

**(23:23)**

Please disregard my previous messages. 

**(23:24)**

 

Jesse smiled bemusedly at his handheld and closed the screen. He opened it right back up again and squinted at the date on the bottom left corner. He closed the screen, waited a few seconds, then opened it and found Angie’s message box. 

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Ratón Vaquero:**

Merry xmas!

what’s got your lab partner all excited??

**(23:26)**

**[Agent: ZIEGLER, A.] Angie:**

Happy Christmas Jesse! I hope yoou’re in good health!

**(23:28)**

You’re* And I don’t know? I’ll ask

**(23:29)**

 

Satisfied he was about to get answers, Jesse went back to nursing his drink. His phone buzzed under his palm a few minutes later, and he frowned when he read Angie’s cryptic response.

 

**[Agent: ZIEGLER, A.] Angie:**

:)

**(23:32)**

**[Agent: MCCREE, J.] Ratón Vaquero:**

....what r u tow hiding?

**(23:33)**

*two

**(23:34)**

He waited a few minutes for an answer, but got none. He scratched his head beneath his hat and tipped back the rest of his drink. The bartender immediately poured him another from the bottle at his elbow. Jesse raised the small glass towards him and grinned his thanks, then looked over at Sombra as she somehow managed to keep her balance while sitting in the most forced casual position imaginable. His comm buzzed again and he took a quick peek at it just to see if Angela had actually responded.

 

**[Agent: SHIMADA, H.] Archer:**

Ignore them.

**(23:39)**

 

And so the Shimada’s radio silence was finished on both fronts. Jesse went to send a reply, but got distracted when he felt Sombra’s gaze on him suddenly change intensity. She looked away the second he looked up at her, but she didn’t quash the smug grin on her face quick enough for him not to take notice. He pocketed his phone and lifted himself off the counter to tug back the brim of his hat. 

“You just gonna sit there and stare at me all night?” He called out. 

She tipped her martini glass back and forth, feigning innocence as she watched the way the liquid sloshed around. But then she sighed and put it down on a napkin and shuffled over to him with her stool in tow. 

“Here I was thinking I happened to find you,” She set her stool directly across his at the corner of the counter and reached out to pull her martini back towards herself. Her long nails clinked against the stem, and she went on,  _ “Pero algo me dice que fue al revez. _ How did you know I’d be here?”[1]

Jesse smirked at her, not taken aback by her casual tone, speaking like they were two friends catching up and not two losers spending Christmas Eve alone in a bar, meeting face-to-face for the first time. And they were far from friendly. He took note of the hand she kept in her jacket pocket, packing heat in case he tried anything. Peacekeeper was a second away if she decided to try and draw. The bartender, to his credit, seemed aware of both of these facts and was giving them each a reproachful and very frightening look that they both acknowledged with a cautious nod. Jesse turned back to Sombra to answer her question.

“You’re not that difficult to find if you stake out the town and ask the right people about needin’ a favor. Besides, your contact’s standing you up, ain’t he?” 

“Ah. I’ll take it he’s not coming?” 

“They wanted you t’help ‘em kill off the youngster that was runnin’ fer mayor.” He propped his chin on his mechanical arm. “You’d’ve gotten the details at this meetin’. I knew you wouldn’t’ve taken it. Saved you time, really. Now you can spend it with me.”

Her face flashed a look of surprise. She answered him slowly in an amused tone. “While we both seem to…  _ como se dice… algo de ese mendigo deporte…” _ [2]

Jesse’s eyes widened as he realized she’d misinterpreted his words pretty hilariously. But he offered the idiom regardless. “Bat for the same team?” 

She snapped her fingers then pointed at him in thanks for the phrase. “No, bat for both teams.” She flipped her dyed hair over her shoulder and pointed at his face with a shiny purple talon. “While we both seem to bat for both teams, I thought your type was more along the lines of, ‘anachronism’ and not so much, ‘cyberpunk’.” She finished her sentence with a waggle of her fingers. 

Jesse snorted and shoved his glass away from himself, aware of the fact he was fast approaching his limit of sobriety. 

“There anythin’ you  _ don’t _ know, Sombrita?”  

Sombra traced her finger around the rim of her glass and stared at the gunslinger. 

“There’s too much I don’t know. And I don’t like it.” She admitted. Not begrudging or angry, simply stating facts. “So,” she reached out and flicked a peanut shell off his sarape, “You’re obviously not here to kill me.  _ Que quieres, vaquero?” _ [3]

Already past the pleasantries. Jesse straightened his back and watched her mirror his change in posture. 

“Well, Sombrita, you said somethin’ back in that warehouse in Japan. You said-” 

“Kings and queens and humpty dumpty sat on a wall, humpty dumpty had a great fall-  _ las pendejadas que se usan en los programas de aprendizaje, te juro-” _ she finished for him, her appraising eyes moving past him and onto the pretty pink omnic that came up behind him to order a drink. “I say a lot of things, Jesse James.”[4]

“Oh, I know that. But I also know you work for Talon. You were in Japan that night Reaper sent those Shimada goons after me. Now their actions lead me to believe they didn’t want me dead, and your presence there means you were supposed to tug on the Shimadas’ leashes in case they got too rowdy. Which they did. Lucky for you Hanzo and Genji were there to save my hide. Now tell me the truth, Som.” He smiled when her lips pursed in a frown. “Little bomb in that handheld you planted on that yakuza malfunctioned, didn’t it?”   

Her frown deepened. “Maybe.” 

Her words confirmed his suspicions. He scowled. “So Gabe wanted me alive. Wanted to ask me his question and then have me nice and captive in case I shot him down, which I did. Asshole!” He slammed his fist against the counter, startling the barkeeper and a few of the patrons, but they looked away when all he did after was bury his face in his hands. “Did the same fuckin’ thing last time. I should’ve known. All this damn time! How didn’t I see it?”

“In his defense, you sort of ruined his plans to tell you himself a bunch of times. I think he got impatient.” She tipped back her martini and pulled his bottle of tequila towards herself after she set the empty glass down. Jesse ran his hand down his face and fought the urge to start tapping his foot against the leg of his stool in frustration. 

“You said you don’t like not knowin’. Well that’s somethin’ we have in common. So tell me, what’d he want me for?”

Sombra laughed, “What are we, Jessito? Friends? I tell you that and Gabi’ll... hmm,  _ como dices, _ tan my hide!” She mocked his accent and poured tequila straight into her glass. Then she gulped it back and hissed at the bite. 

“Gabi?” Jesse leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. “He lets you call him that?” 

_ “Lets? _ He doesn’t get to  _ let _ me do anything. He’s not the boss of me,  _ cabrón _ .”

“Really now? And here I was under the impression I was havin’ a nice drink with my replacement.” 

“Replacement?” she repeated incredulously.   

Jesse nodded and took back the nearly empty bottle from her. He measured there was about a shot and a half left, so he shrugged and downed it in one go. He wiped his mouth and beard with the back of his gloved hand and used the empty bottle to gesture at Sombra. “Let me guess, he took you off the streets or somethin’? You’ve got the looks of one. Delinquent kid desperate to scrape by.” 

Her face blanched at that. He’d touched a nerve. 

_ “Y tú qué sabes de-” _ she sputtered, infuriated. Sensitive subject. He raised both hands in apology.[5]

“Not my intention to offend, ma’am. But you’re well known around these parts. Quite the local hero. The kids on the street seem to think so, and they think highly of you. Say you’re real nice. Not a difficult leap, shared experiences and all.” He smiled apologetically. “It takes one to know one.”

She remained quiet for a minute as she stared blankly at him. Finally, she muttered in a relenting tone, “He didn’t tell me that about you.” 

He lowered his hands slowly and set the bottle on the counter. He leaned in towards her. “But he  _ did _ tell you about me.” He lowered his voice. “You’re always comin’ after me, Som. Why is that? You after that bounty or somethin’? Shouldn’t be takin’ you this long, what with your skills.”

She leaned away from him and put one hand on her hip. “Okay,  _ puto, _ first of all, let’s get one thing straight: I’m not like you, and I’m not Reaper’s lackey.” 

McCree nodded agreeably, and she seemed appeased by that.  

“Secondly,  _ tu no me importas ni una puta mierda, Jesse McCree. _ If that is your real name.”[6]

He played along easily. “Don’t know what you heard, but my name’s not Joel. Best remember that.”

_ “Imbécil.” _ she said, but she was smiling, sly and thoughtful. She spread her knees and planted her elbows on them to prop her chin over her clasped hands. “Okay, Jesse James. Here’s what I’ll tell you for free: Yes, I always come after you, and yes, I have a reason for it. No, I don’t know what Reaper is. And I also don’t know how he ended up a smoke monster, so don’t ask.” 

Jesse kindly pointed out that she hadn’t told him anything he didn’t already know himself, and she politely told him to bite her. The bartender swooped in and took the empty bottle of tequila and both of their empty glasses. They put in new drink orders with very good manners. Jesse accepted his Corona while Sombra took a Tecate just to be contrary. The pink omnic left the building with new eye candy on her arms, and both Jesse and Sombra did another cursory visual sweep of the room for anything suspicious.

Halfway through their bottles and edging towards just a bit too drunk, Jesse spoke up again. 

“So what do I have to pay for you to say something useful? And don’t ask me for Athena’s system passcodes, ‘cause I wouldn’t tell you even if I knew ‘em.”   

“I don’t care about that.” She said, and Jesse highly suspected she’d followed that up with an  _ ‘I can already get those’ _ in her head. She sounded drunk too. “You’re here because of Gabriel. You’re here because you’re sentimental.  _ Eres su hijo,  _ and you want him back.”[7]

“You’re gettin’ ahead of yourself there. He’s a homicidal maniac based on what I know now.” He shot her down. “What I want is to know what Talon did to him to make him into that Reaper and how much of Gabriel is left. I want to know where to look for those answers.” 

“Oh, Talon did something to Gabriel, alright. But Talon didn’t make the Reaper. That one’s on you guys.”

Jesse froze with his bottle halfway to his mouth. He placed it back on the countertop and stared at Sombra, hard. 

“The fuck are you saying?” 

“I’m saying I don’t know what happened to him. But I’m telling you where to look. And for free too.” She pinned him with a meaningful look as she finished off her beer. She smacked her lips after the last few golden dregs disappeared past her puckered lips. “Now tell me, how much would you give to get him back?” 

He watched her balance the bottle on its neck on the counter and frowned. “I just told you I’m not tryin’ to-”

She cut him off sharply. “How much?” 

“I don’t know!” He blustered, waving his hands and faintly aware of the fact the alcohol was having an effect on him. “What on earth do you pay to save a man’s soul?”  

“I don’t know, Jesse James. It’s why I’m asking you.  _ Andale amigo, ilumíname.” _ [8]

“Oh-ho! So we’re friends now?” 

“Yeah, sure. Friends help friends  _ y toda esa mierda. _ I tell you where to look, you share what you find, and then we’re both free to kill each other.”[9]

“You do realize you’ve got nothin’ to hold me to that.” He told her with raised brows. She shrugged, unconcerned. 

_ “Que dices? Una alma por una alma. Quieres darle mitad y mitad?”  _ She asked nonsensically. Then she tipped to the side and had to catch herself before she fell off her seat.[10]

_ “Si, claro. La mitad de mi alma.” _ He answered. She wasn’t making any more sense, so Jesse let her struggle with her balance alone and stood to leave. He slid some money towards the bartender.  _ “Mas el quince de propina.” _ [11]

He paused before he could take a step towards the door, the talk about lives and debts and payments bringing his own words swirling back to the front of his mind. A promise made out of gratitude.

 

_ My life’s yours. _

 

“Afterall, due to recent events, I’m the sole proprietor of my soul. Or whatever’s left of it.” He said quietly to himself, and Sombra showed no sign that she had heard. But she did see him making to leave, and she reached out to tug on the edge of his sarape. He pulled her hand off and looked to the bartender with a sigh.  

_ “La conoces, verdad? Puedes asegurar que llegue bien a casa?” _ He asked him. The old man gave him a small nod and quirked an eyebrow down at Sombra, whose hand had clamped right back onto the wool of his cape.[12]

“Wait. One more question. Nothin’ to do with Gabi.” Sombra’s words dragged a bit. 

Jesse shifted a hip to press against the counter and he looked down at her curiously.

“Shoot.” he told her. 

“Saty- Sym, uh… Agent Symmetra. Is she… uh…” 

The nervousness was new. So was the way she was looking down at her hands gripping onto red wool, trying and failing to pull off nonchalant. 

“Single?” He hazarded a guess. 

“No!” She snapped and glared up at him. She let go and stood up too. “She fell off the grid a few days ago. Is she safe? After the LumériCo fiasco I tried keeping tabs to make sure I didn’t fuck her over too much-” 

“So you do have a conscience.” 

_ “Ay cállate quieres? _ It’s not like that, I just-”[13] __

Jesse’s eyes widened, then his lips widened into a grin. “You  _ like _ her.” 

_ “No estes chingando, hablo en serio!” _ [14]

“Yeah, I can tell you’re pretty serious. But word of advice, Sombrita,” he gestured to her lacquered nails and slurred his words a bit, “If you’re serious, you might wanna get rid of those.” he said with a wink. Behind him, the bartender smothered a small laugh. Sombra sent a withering look his way before aiming it at McCree. 

“They’re on the glove, stupid.” Sombra flexed her fingers and examined the nails against her palm. “And I didn’t mean I was serious about that and you know it.” 

Jesse laughed at her. “Oh trust me, if you’re my replacement, then I know your type.” 

“I’m not some replacement, I’m better than you,” she sneered.

“Upgrade, then. Don’t change the fact you’ve got it pretty bad already. Can’t blame ya, she is mighty pretty. And she was safe, last I heard.” Jesse shrugged, deciding to throw her the bone in thanks for her cooperation. He saved his breath on threats, tipped his hat in farewell, and started walking backwards towards the door.  

She kicked him in the shins to help him leave quicker. 

* * *

 

Years, months, days, hours. 

Hours spent stuck in his own head was the unfortunate byproduct of McCree’s current preoccupation. It wasn’t something Jesse particularly enjoyed- in fact it was something he usually steadfastly avoided. Problem was, there wasn’t much else to do. His biggest lead was in China healing the wounded, and his second biggest lead was himself. 

If what Sombra said was true, if Overwatch was to blame for the birth of the Reaper, then suddenly Angela’s stitched lips made a nasty amount of sense. But that left the other half of her clue. 

What had Talon done to Gabriel before the owl mask joined the equation? 

Jesse’d dug through what files Athena had left of Blackwatch from before the fall, but all she had was everything the media got their hands on all those years ago. It hadn’t been a lot, but it had been enough to rightly enrage the rest of the world and criminalize their faction. But the more Jesse looked at it, the more he realized what was missing. The United Nations seized some important intel, no question about it. But what they gathered was merely what the Overwatch higher-ups like Morrison knew. Watered-down reports. Results with no playbook to go along with them. The only reason Blackwatch survived as long as it had in the shadows was because their actions never saw the light of day.

In the end, their results were what got thrust into the public’s eye. But the whole and gnarly truth was still pure speculation, thanks to Gabe’s quick thinking and his stockpile of physical records. Blackwatch fell because Overwatch couldn’t keep a secret. But their playbook never left the shadows. And now it was with Talon, courtesy of Gabriel Reyes. 

Meaning that whatever happened to Gabriel Reyes, Blackwatch had everything to do with it. 

The thought made Jesse feel more than a little tainted. He remembered that day on the hypertrain, the familiar voices filtered through helmets. His old teammates, felled by his trusty six-shooter. Blackwatch hadn’t been made up of criminals; they had been decent people. Jesse, with his Deadlock tattoos, and a handful of the others were the outliers. His teammates were just as likely to join a terrorist organization as Commander Reyes. Which was to say; not likely at all.

But there they were. And Jesse didn’t understand.         

At a location differing vastly from Dorado in both latitude and longitude, Jesse sat slumped over the counter at a bar, the scraped and peeling wood sticky against his scruffy cheek. He sat on a tall stool, worrying the torn edges of his hat in his lap as he dredged up memories long buried in hopes of figuring out when and how Talon had started influencing his commander.

Around him were walls lined with metal roofing sheets, above him the ancient air conditioner chugged along to give the bar and grill’s patrons a respite from the heat permeating from the outside. The wave of air from the ceiling fans that worked in tandem with the cooling system blew Jesse’s hair over his eyes. The place was barely open, and there were more families taking advantage of the grill than there were abject loners taking advantage of the bar looking to drink themselves into a stupor.  Benches stretched across the back wall, caged by cheap metal chairs padded with stained leather. There was an old pool table that seemed like it’d seen better days maybe half a century ago pushed off to the side, being used by a couple fellows that looked like they could be part of one of the rougher biker gangs around town. 

Jesse made a mental note to steal one of their bikes and ordered another round.

Most of Blackwatch’s activity didn’t come out of the Headquarters in Geneva. The brunt of their training took place in Grand Mesa. Grand Mesa had been Commander Reyes’ turf, and the place most likely to hold traces of Blackwatch’s cache of physical records. If Jesse was going to make any headway, he had a feeling Colorado was on his list of spots to hit on his little vacation. Unlucky for him, Grand Mesa was one of the few Watchpoints now out of Overwatch’s jurisdiction. It was Helix’s now, and Jesse was cocky, sure, but not cocky enough to believe he could sneak onto Helix Security International property with a half-assed plan and no backup. 

He didn’t even know what to look for. He had a few ideas of where Gabe could have hidden the files before the shitshow hit Geneva, but there was no way to know for sure. If fortune were on his side, Angela would wrap up her business in the Chinese Watchpoint before he decided to invite himself into Blackwatch’s former base of operations. 

He heaved a sigh and peeled himself off the counter, running a hand through his beard and then his hair to comb it. The woman tending the bar gave him a glance out of wariness and distrust that was the opposite of discrete. He smiled charmingly and politely asked her to point him towards the bathroom. 

He shouldered the bar’s unisex bathroom door open and staggered over to the little sink once his fumbling mechanical fingers managed to lock the door. He needed a tune-up. He should start a checklist of the things Angie would nag him for once they were back in the same room together. 

As he stared into the smeared mirror hanging over the sink, he began the checklist starting off with the greasy hair, the dry skin, his bloodshot eyes, and the dirt packed beneath his fingernails. Then onto the way his cheeks hung gaunt beneath the scruff of his beard. He wasn’t eating regularly because he was too busy running, and he wasn’t sleeping regularly because of the dreams. He wasn’t talking to anyone, and apart from random check-ins from Winston he was off the grid. He had too much on his mind to leave room for remembering to look after himself. 

The cowboy’s flesh hand went to fiddle with the sink’s tap, and the old plumbing groaned and wobbled before letting out a steady burst of water warmed by the desert heat. He cupped his hands to gather a puddle of it in his palms, then splashed his face and considered scratching ‘dry skin’ off the list. 

He braced both hands on either sides of the sink and squeezed his eyes shut against the light shining through the bathroom’s small window. It was doing neither him nor his sleep-deprivation headache any favors. Another one for the list. Ah, the good doctor. She was going to have hell in store for him if he didn’t clean himself up before reporting back to base. He could see her look of disappointment now. 

He could see her now, in his head, giving him that scared look she’d given him on the transport heading home from the mess with LumériCo when he asked about Reaper. He hoped whatever she and Mei found in that Watchpoint shed some light on Reaper’s condition, because at the moment Jesse was feeling too lost for comfort. 

He could see her looking at him, desperate and pleading as he shut down the video feed on his communicator, cutting her off mid-word. If he let Angela keep talking, she would cry, and her tears would be able to do what her words couldn’t. She couldn’t cry. He couldn’t make her cry, not again, because then he’d have to haul ass to wherever she was stationed and beg her forgiveness. And he couldn’t do that. After all, he’d called to say goodbye.

And he- 

He sees them, he-

 

\----------

He sees them, just inside the Commander’s office in the Watchpoint’s basement. He sees Jack’s hair, more platinum now than gold. He sees the furrow of Gabriel’s brow past Jack’s receding coif, his own graying stubble hidden beneath his trademark beanie. They’re fighting again. They always seem to be fighting, but never within the hearing range of the other agents. If it weren’t for the message in his inbox from Flores telling him Gabe was wanting to see him, Jesse wouldn’t even know about this particular spat. Neither are dumb enough to raise their voices and get the attention of the entire base, but that doesn’t mean the fight isn’t ugly. 

Jack’s face likens to an overripe tomato, and if Gabe had the complexion for it he’d be red too. Jesse sees both their shoulders are tense and raised high as their owners lean forward into each other’s personal space to hurl truths best kept unsaid. They’re dressed in their respective uniforms: Overwatch blues and Blackwatch greys. They look every inch the authority figures they are, both too evenly matched to loom over the other.   

He hears Gabe first.  _ “Ya estoy harto de tus excusas, Morrison! No, cállate, no me interrumpas-!” _ [15]

Then Jack second. “I still don’t know what you think you’ll get out of this, Gabriel! And you know I can’t understand when you-!”

Jesse stops at the doorway and tries to backtrack but it’s too late. Gabriel catches sight of him and turns, so Jesse raises his hands. “Whoa there, I interrupting somethin’?”

_ “Lárgate, vaquero.”  _ Gabriel snarls at him, and Jesse’s too worn out to cool his own temper.[16]

_ “Oye, no te me tires a mi, yo que te hice?” _ [17]

“Why are you telling him to leave, Gabriel? He’s the reason we’re here!” Jack interjects, and Jesse’s too put off by the fact he’s apparently the subject of their fight to thank him for the attempted defense. 

_ “Te dije que te calles-” _ [18]

_ “Hablan de mí?” _ He cuts in with a grin and leans on the doorway as a cheeky distraction before Gabe has the chance to explode properly.  _ “Espero que sea de lo tan guapo que soy.” _ [19]

His faux big headedness breaks the tense spell. It cools Gabe down a bit, and he snorts a laugh.  _ “Tu cállate también, cabrón.” _ [20]

Then he looks at Jack, and it’s like the argument never happened. His brow smooths out, and he shakes his head to clear it. “Sorry. Sorry, you’re both right. We’ll finish this conversation later, Jack. Can you give us a minute?”

If Jack’s shocked by the sudden lack of animosity in Gabriel’s tone, he doesn’t show it. He looks at them both and lingers on Jesse, pinning him half with pity and half apprehension. Jesse can’t help but resent the former half. 

“Come find me when he’s finished with you.” Jack tells him, and it sounds more like a request than an order. Jesse makes a noncommittal noise of acknowledgement, and doesn’t move quick enough to avoid being smacked in the shoulder by Jack’s upper arm as he moves past him out the door. Jesse steps into the room. He hooks his thumbs around his belt buckle and tips his chin up to address his boss. 

“Flores said you wanted to see me?”

Gabe sighs and stomps over to his desk to open his tablet. 

“Good news and bad, McCree. Pick your poison.” 

“Hit me with the bad, then shoot me while I’m down.” Jesse answers with a tired grin. What would it be this time? They were done with Japan and Egypt. Maybe something in the States, or Europe. Hopefully nowhere that’d take too long, he really just wants to crash and forget everything for a while.  

“Apt way of putting it.” Gabe sighs, and if Jesse looks exhausted, then Gabe looks like he’s been shat over a cliff. His fingers fiddle with the contents of his tablet slowly, and Jesse gets the feeling he’s stalling for something. He frowns, and Gabe elaborates. “We’re goin’ down kid. Geneva’s investigation is closing in, and it’s only a matter of time before they break Athena. I think it’s time I go into damage control mode.” 

Jesse blinks at the not-news. It’s nothing he doesn’t know already. They’ve all been bracing for it. More and more Blackwatch members have deserted, and Gabe’s been having a tough time filling in the empty slots on their missions, hence Jesse’s current bone tiredness. 

“And the good news?” He asks. Gabe continues to stare down at his tablet, refusing to meet his eyes.

“Good news is Jack’s agreed to take you. You’re officially going on Overwatch’s roster, clean slate.” 

Jesse blinks again, slower this time. He takes the words in and mulls them over, going through his little game of trying to find Gabe’s angle before Gabe gets the chance to explain himself, but he comes up empty. 

“Using the times you’ve lent me over t’them as a base for the forgeries. Like you did with Genji.” Jesse shifts his weight onto his opposite hip and crosses his arms over his chest. “What’s the plan,  _ jefe?” _ He asks, confused and hesitant but ready to obey. “What do you want me to do once I’m in?” 

“This isn’t an op, kid. 

Hesitance becomes anger, with fear rolling in like a storm. “Then what the hell is it?”

“Like I said, damage control. Just ‘cause I’m going down doesn’t mean you have to-” 

“Boss, Genji was one thing, but you can’t do this with me. I’ve been here too damn long. I’m your second! How in the hell’re you planning on pulling this off?” Jesse says, and he tells himself he sounds calm. He sounds reasonable. Stating the facts, simply stating facts. 

Gabe huffs a little laugh and mutters under his breath,  _ “Hombre de poca fe.” _ [21]

“I’m serious, Gabe! And you know I don’t agree with what you did to Genji! You know how the folks up top look at him like he’s just some weapon! With him bein’ Overwatch, Ana gone, and now you, who’s stopping them from exploiting him? If you go down, what happens to him? They’ll-” 

Gabriel finally looks up at him, “Shimada’s gone, McCree. He left, remember that?”  

“He might come back!” 

_ “No te hagas pendejo, mijo. _ It’s not a good look on you. He ran before everyone else started running. He’s not coming back, and that’s probably for the best.”[22]

“I’m not your son.” He says, and he’s not sure why the endearment is suddenly bothering him now. He’s on edge, his skin is prickling. There’s dread settling in his stomach, twisting and writhing like snakes. 

Gabe glares. “Watch your tone, McCree. I’m not in the mood for your bullshit right now.”

“And who says it’s only you that has to go down anyway?” Jesse shouts over him. “What about Jack takin’ on some goddamn credit that don’t land him up on that shiny golden pedestal o’ his? You know what they’re sayin’ about you, and I know you’re too stupid to do a thing about it, but him!? The UN, the World Council, they’re scapegoatin’ you now that word’s got out and he ain’t liftin’ a finger-!” 

“McCree, stay out of it. I’m only telling you once.”

He sounds final, so Jesse tries a different route. He switches his tone from angry to quiet and private. He drops the guise of commander and agent and steps up to Gabriel’s desk. “We can fix this, Gabe. You can’t be givin’ up! You don’t deserve this shit! Jack has to pick up the slack, he has to answer to what he’s let us do under the table! This ain’t just on you! And if you’re so dead set on going down, then I’m going down wi-”

_ “McCree!”  _ Gabriel yells, and Jesse snaps his mouth shut. His chest is heaving, he wants to scream. He wants this to be  _ over, _ he wants reality to  _ stop. _ This was never supposed to happen. They were the good guys, this didn’t happen to the good guys, and-

“I’m-” Gabriel says, and his voice is tight, like he’s fighting with himself over something. He steps around his desk and keeps his distance from McCree except for the hand he reaches out to show Jesse his tablet’s surface. On its flickering screen is an official looking document with a little picture of him tacked onto the corner. Jesse doesn’t read it. He looks back up at Gabe and wills the panic bubbling like acid up his throat to go away, but it doesn’t listen. 

“I’m trying to protect you.” Gabriel says, and he sounds so tired.

“I don’t need you protectin’ me, Gabe! I’m tellin’ you, if you’re goin’ down then I’m-”

“Jesse,  _ mijo, ya basta. Firma.” _ Gabriel orders him, and he holds out the stylus pen for Jesse to take.[23]

Jesse knocks it out of his hand. “I ain’t your damn kid!” 

Gabriel watches the pen go clattering onto the tile floor. He stares, and something in his eyes changes. He turns back to look Jesse dead-on and says, “You’re right. You’re not. And I don’t have a damn reason to keep you around. So now either you sign those papers or you get out of my sight, because I won’t have you under my command any longer.”

His words ring in Jesse’s ears and effectively knock any retort Jesse might have had out of existence. The finality of his decision hangs heavy in the air, and the room goes silent. Gabriel stares Jesse down until he must get tired of looking at him, because he makes a disgusted noise in the back of his throat and slams the tablet down on his desk. Without another word, he storms past Jesse and out of the room. Jesse watches him go, wreaking a path through the room like a hurricane, eyes set on Gabriel’s broad shoulders once it’s his back to him and he’s past the door. Jesse starts to run after him, to yell at him to take it back, or to tell him to go fuck himself, but he’s too shaken to get past the door. 

He just watches and lets Gabriel’s back get further and further away, until he’s in the elevator and out of sight. 

And just like that Jesse’s alone. He always ends up that way, doesn’t he? Alone, because no one wants him, because no one cares enough to stay, and those that do always die. 

Alone. 

He turns back to Gabriel’s desk and stares blankly at the files on his tablet. He stares at the little icon of his face, he stares at Jack’s signature at the bottom. He stares, and he slowly steps forward. His spurs and the tap of his heels are the only noise around save his slow breathing. 

He dips down and picks up the stylus from where it landed on the floor. 

He signs next to Morrison, and he pulls out his comm to call Angela.

 

_ \---CRACK--- _

 

Jesse opened his eyes and forced himself back into the present. The crack was the wrong sound for a gunshot, and different from an explosive. His eyes couldn’t focus on what was in front of him, but his right hand registered the feeling of moisture. In his left was a broken half of a sink basin, the porcelain nearly weightless clutched in his prosthetic arm. Slowly, he took a breath, and slowly, he tried recounting where he was. January 2077. He was in some mom & pop bar and grill combo in the middle of the Sonoran desert. He was safe. 

He was alone. 

He shook his head to clear out the din of his memories and considered going out to ask the bartender for her strongest drink, but held off and twisted the tap closed before he flooded the bathroom. He dropped his half of the sink on the wet floor and dug through his pockets for his comm. 

He opened it and clicked his tongue at seeing he had an hours old message sitting unread in his inbox.

 

**[** **▓▓▓▓▓▓▓** **]** **▓▓▓▓▓▓▓** **:**

no tienes que hacerlo todo solo, menso

**(11:57)** [24]

 

Fucking hound dog. He was going to have to convince Winston to get him a different phone with preemptive measures to ensure Sombra couldn’t reach him on that one too. Putting that issue aside for later, Jesse pulled up Athena’s interface to enquire over the current status of the agents in Watchpoint Gibraltar. 

She informed him that the only agents not back on base were Mercy, Lúcio, Mei, Symmetra, Hanzo, and himself. She requested an arrival date from him so that she could inform Winston and he could forward the message to Geneva as their suspension drew closer to being revoked. Jesse paused with his thumb over the keyboard, thinking. He was getting nowhere on his own, and he could feel himself spiraling. He needed a level head. 

Maybe it was time to go back.

He tapped out an answer to Athena and closed his phone. He shoved it into his back pocket and locked the bathroom door from the inside to delay the discovery of the damage he’d done when he walked out to pay his tab. He left a more than generous tip to cover the cost of repairs and swept out of the doorway and into the early afternoon sun. A glance around the parking area found him a pair of hoverbikes parked against the establishments’ fence. 

After some fiddling with his handheld and a few tools off his belt, he was riding towards the line of the horizon with the bike’s rightful owner none the wiser. 

* * *

 

The Rock of Gibraltar made for some pretty dramatic scenery in the dying end of winter. In the early dusk, its silhouette was stark black against the bleak cloudy grey of the sky. Jesse stared at it from afar on his perch on a bench on a pier. He tugged his sarape tighter around himself to ward off the chill and sighed before forcing himself back onto his feet. He had a long walk ahead of him.

As told by Athena, he’d beaten Mercy to base. She, Mei, and Hanzo were set to rendezvous in Busan and weren’t due to arrive until the following day.

“You’re early.” She told him cheerfully when hours later found him outside one of the base’s side doors with his handheld pressed to the lock and his thumb on the scanner. “We were expecting you tomorrow with the rest of the agents. Winston is asleep at the moment, but I can wake him if you’d like. Though I would prefer if you let him rest, he hasn’t been sleeping well the past few-” 

“Let the guy rest, ‘Thena. Lord knows I ain’t got the energy for a welcome wagon. I just wanna hang my hat and call it a night.” He lied easily. The lock beeped, and she let him into the base without further fanfare. He walked through the base on autopilot until he reached the dormitory wing.

It took him a few tries to remember the last passcode he’s set his door to, but once he got in his room he dumped his travel bag by his desk and kicked off his boots. His room was spotless, courtesy of the small cleaning bot that Hanzo had wrangled for them when they started sleeping together properly. He probably had that robot to thank for the fact that Hanzo’s patience had yet to run thin with him.

His sarape went onto the hook next to the doorway, and his hat got hung up over it. Jesse lifted both hands over his head and stretched, then winced at the series of pops that followed his movements. Then he slid open his door and stepped out into the quiet hallway, intent on waking up their resident ninja. 

But when he came to a stop at Genji’s door, he was surprised to find it cracked open with the lights off inside. He heard movement, a steady back and forth that resembled pacing paired with quiet murmurs. Jesse gave the doorframe three light knocks and waited for Genji to respond, but he got nothing.

He peered through the opening and spied the soft glow of Genji’s cybernetics against the inky black of the night sky through his open window. He was speaking softly into the mic of his handheld, antenna on and powered up, no doubt receiving audio from his device. But his visor and mask were off, as were the hard shell casings of his arms and torso. His hair was sticking up in all directions. Jesse ducked back behind the door when Genji reached the end of his line and swiveled to pace again in the opposite direction. He looked soft and off guard. 

He looked distracted. 

Jesse had an idea. 

Keeping time with the near silent footfalls through the door, Jesse whipped out his handheld and silently tapped a request to Athena for her to dim the lights so that Genji wouldn’t notice the difference when Jesse slowly slid his door open further. 

His timing was just right, Genji slowly walked facing his window with his back to the door when Jesse snuck in. He didn’t even really have to concentrate on keeping quiet since all he had on his feet were a pair of socks. Biting his bottom lip in concentration and grinning in anticipation, Jesse reached out his hand and quickly jabbed Genji’s flesh arm.

Genji yelped, his short scream accompanied by a small jump and his hands losing their grip on his phone as he went into a fighting stance, about-facing and ready to land a knifehand strike on his intruder, only to find Jesse laughing his ass off a safe distance away. Genji’s phone fell to the ground, and the screen flickered as the device threatened to close.  

“McCree!” Genji snarled once he processed it was Jesse and not some threat to the base. He relaxed his posture but stomped over to him to demand, “What the fuck!?”

“Holy shit.” Jesse struggled to breathe, then he ducked and rolled out of reach to avoid the angry kick Genji tried to land on him. He backed into the wall and doubled over laughing at the color rising on the cyborg’s scarred face. “I snuck up on you! I finally fuckin’ did it!” 

Genji grumbled at him about how it wasn’t fair since he had been distracted, and Jesse took in a breath to recount all the times Genji had taken advantage of Jesse’s attention being elsewhere to pull his ninja shit, but Genji spoke before he could get a word out. 

“Why are you here? Winston said you wouldn’t be back until tomorrow.” 

“It  _ is _ tomorrow, technically speakin’. And what? You sayin’ you’re not glad to see me? What’re you even up to, pacing in the middle of a dark room?”

Genji looked around himself as if just barely figuring out it had gotten dark. Jesse tried to peek around him to get a look at the contact name on his dropped phone. “Who’re you talkin’ to?”

“No one!” Genji sputtered just as a cheerful voice yelled “Hey Woody!” from the handheld lying on the floor.  

Jesse raised both eyebrows, then lunged around his friend to confirm that it was indeed Lúcio on the other line. Genji grabbed him around the middle and hurled him across the room, but not before Jesse caught sight of Lúcio’s name written above the speaker icon dead center on the transparent screen.   

“Lulu! How are you? Saw you on the news a few weeks back!” He called out, and Genji gave a closed-mouth scream and went after him to forcibly shut his mouth. 

Lúcio laughed, shy and pleased all at once. “Aw, you saw that?” Jesse scrambled to climb onto Genji’s bed and over to get out of range of the cyborg’s grasping hands. Genji grabbed his leg and yanked him back, and Jesse ended up falling onto the floor with a thud. Lúcio, none the wiser, kept talking. “Hey, since you’re there, can you make sure Genji goes to bed? He’s not listening to me.”

“Sure thing pardner!” Jesse hollered. Lúcio gave a triumphant laugh, and then Genji delivered a punch to the back of Jesse’s head. He retaliated by twisting and using his prosthetic hand to grab him by his left shoulder to throw him off. Genji landed in a heap by his phone and protested weakly from the floor.  

_ “Sore wa zurui yo!” _ [25]

Lúcio answered him in Japanese, and Jesse’s eyebrows shot up to his hairline. He mouthed a question at Genji, but Genji ignored him. He grabbed his phone and bid their teammate good night, and Lúcio signed off with a cheerful good night to them both. They sat and stared until Genji’s phone went into sleep mode. When the light from their various prosthetics was the only light in the room, Jesse cleared his throat. 

“Since when does Lú speak Japanese?”

“He’s Brazilian.” Genji said as if it were an answer. Jesse made a face at him and got ignored again.  _ “Okaeri, _ by the way. How was your vacation?”[26]

Jesse shrugged and pulled himself up to sit against the frame of Genji’s bed. Across from him Genji assumed a cross-legged position. 

“Not as enlightenin’ as I’d hoped it’d be.” He admitted, and Genji’s eyes narrowed. 

“I see. Is that why you’re here?” He tilted his head. “Can I provide enlightenment?” 

“Maybe.” He said. Then he sighed, “I dunno, Genji-kun. I’m all turned around right now. Humor me for a minute, and we’ll see if it lessens the weight on my chest.”  

“Of course.” Genji assured him plainly, and Jesse smiled at the simplicity of him. He inhaled and let it out slowly. He wanted to smoke, but ever since he’d given Hanzo that nasty bruise on his arm he’d gone cold turkey, and that was just another thing to add to Angie’s list. 

There wasn’t a good way to start the conversation, so he opened without further preamble. 

“Why did you run when you did, Genji?” Jesse paused for a reaction, and plowed on when Genji didn’t move an inch. “I know we talked ‘bout this, the wanderin’ and the wonderin’, but…”

Genji cut off his blithering with a wave of his hand. When he responded, it almost sounded as if he’d been expecting Jesse’s line of questioning. “Would it sound too farfetched if I told you my dragon told me to do it?”

Jesse blinked. “Well…” He scratched his beard. “Considerin’ I have first-hand experience with dragons gettin’ chatty, I can’t say it would.” 

Genji laughed and shook his head. “I forgot about that! But yes. It isn’t ‘chatting’ with me, but I… I get a feeling when something is about to go wrong.” 

Jesse nodded, and a question popped into his head, but he bit his lip to keep from asking it. Genji looked at him as if he were transparent and answered the question anyway. 

“Yes, I knew something was wrong the night Hanzo tried to kill me. I just didn’t heed the warning.” He told him softly, then mustered himself and barrelled on. “Back then... Things were getting worse even before Amari-san passed. At the time, I was too lost in myself to really take notice. I was obsessed with taking down the Shimada-gumi, and I didn’t pay attention to what was happening to Overwatch outside of our Blackwatch missions.”

“But being a part of Overwatch was a Bell Curve.  _ Sono katachi.” _ [27] He brought one glowing hand up level with his chest to illustrate, “I started at the bottom, here. Full of hate, hurting Angela-sama and scaring the wits out of Lena.” Then he steadily lifted his hand higher. 

“But Angela-sama was patient, and Lena made jokes during our endless hours shared being poked in the infirmary. Winston helped, and Reyes was willing to take me in. And you. You looked at me and told me I looked like Kamen Rider.” 

Jesse grinned at him. “Actually, I’m pretty sure I told ya you look like a Power Ranger.”

“Do not ruin the moment, Jesse-kun.” Genji chided him as his hand settled over their heads at the highest point of the curve. They watched the ends of his fingers tip downwards in preparation for the nosedive.

“I wasn’t healed, but I was getting better. If things had stayed on that trajectory, I may not have needed Zenyatta-sensei. In the long run, I may have come to the same realizations he taught me myself. Or perhaps not, but I had a good support system here.” He slowly lowered his hand.

“But then came the rumors, Gerard, and Amélie’s disappearance. Amari-san died, and Morrison’s paranoia grew. I got tossed between Reyes and Morrison so much that when Reyes came to me with the transfer papers already filled out with nonsense to keep my involvement in Blackwatch hidden, I didn’t even think of turning him down. I thought they saw me as a tool, and I lost the unsteady grip I had on my humanity. So when I saw my brother on our final mission to Hanamura…”

“You ran.” Jesse whispered. Genji brought his hand down to his lap and closed his eyes. 

“I knew. I… I don’t know how to explain how I knew, but I felt it was time to leave. Seeing Hanzo, feeling that  _ hate _ and  _ rage _ … it was unnatural.” He opened his eyes, green and bright in the darkness. “Jesse, in the moments I lay dying at his feet I felt betrayal and sadness. Only once I was safe did I allow fear and hate to overwhelm me. My brother was the catalyst, but my dragon had been warning me for a long time. I decided to heed the warning.”

Genji fell silent and waited for Jesse to speak. Jesse tipped his head back to stare out at the night sky. 

“Thanks for humorin’ me, Genji-kun.” 

“Did I enlighten you?” Genji asked, and Jesse was relieved to hear a smile in his voice. He looked back at him to confirm it, and smiled too. 

“Not sure yet. But you did do wonders for the weight on my chest, I’ll tell ya that.” 

Genji hopped to his feet and took two steps forward to offer Jesse a hand up. “It is late. Go to bed, McCree.” 

“Only if you promise to do the same.” Jesse took it and let himself be pulled to his feet. “And I will tell Lúcio if you don’t. What was that about by the way? Your face went pretty red when-”

“Good night, McCree!” Genji said, and he shoved him out of his room and slammed the door behind him. Jesse heard the lock click, and he chuckled on the way back to his room. 

Yeah, coming back was a good idea. 

* * *

 

The insistent beeping of his handheld charging on its dock on his bedside table was what woke McCree late the next morning. He groaned and tried knocking it away for all the good that did him- the beeping just came from farther away, but it was still annoying. Jesse tossed his covers off and didn’t have time to marvel at the fact he had slept through the night without the aid of alcohol when he saw the not-name flashing on his phone’s screen.

He input his passcode and glared at the newest message from Sombra.

 

**[** **▓▓▓▓▓▓▓** **]** **▓▓▓▓▓▓▓** **:**

eres un mentiroso jesse james >:( 

o un bobo

**(11:05)** [28]

 

Her message didn’t get a reply, same as all her previous attempts at contact. Jesse closed the phone and tossed it onto his bed, then made his way to the bathroom for a shower. He asked Athena to tell him if Winston would be busy by the time he got out, and she told him Winston would be waiting for him in the labs at his earliest convenience. Jesse figured he shouldn’t keep the scientist waiting, so he forwent shaving and made his way to the labs sans belt, hat, or chestpiece, and buttoned up his shirt as he went. 

Winston sat on his tire in front of his desk. He looked up at the sound of Jesse’s spurs. 

“Athena said you arrived last night. Your last check-in was three days ago. Anything to report since then?” He asked. He gave Jesse a smile at the sight of his dripping wet hair and half-undone shirt. “You didn’t have to rush, McCree.” 

“No, but I wanted to, Commander.” He said, and he never got tired of the way Winston blustered whenever he got called that. He finished doing up his shirt and gestured out the door with his thumb. “And yeah, actually. I got somethin’ to report, but the day’s nice. Mind joinin’ me for a stroll?”  

Winston gave him a bemused look, but he shrugged and nodded. “Sure, why not? Maybe we’ll catch Lena as she flies in.” 

They went out past the practice ranges and along the outer rim of the rock face. The waves crashed against the rocks far down below, and the air smelled of salt and an oncoming storm. Winston settled himself down on the edge of Bastion’s garden, and Jesse leaned against the the cliff face. Bastion herself was nowhere to be seen, probably running inventory back in the warehouse. 

The camera drones weren’t due to fly past their spot for another three minutes. 

“I found Sombra.” 

Winston startled and dropped the dew covered tomato vines he had been inspecting. He adjusted his glasses and looked at him with wide eyes. 

“You- you found-? When? Where!?” 

“Christmas in Dorado.” He told him, and then he disclosed their entire conversation and how she’d managed to hack his phone again. Winston grunted, peeved. 

“I’ll put Lúcio on it once he’s back. I would like to have Satya’s opinion as well, but there’s no telling when Vishkar Corp will allow her to come back, if they ever do…” He trailed off and stared at the ocean around them, morose about her absence. 

“Shit, what do you mean?” Jesse asked, remembering Sombra’s accusation from when he woke up.

“House arrest ended about a week after you left. Then she got called back to Utopaea, and I haven’t heard from her since. I’m hoping that once the UN lifts our suspension I can pull some weight to get some answers.”

Jesse frowned. He considered sending Sombra a message back just to apologize, but he remembered he purposefully left the phone back in his room and shook his head. 

“Well, fuck.” He said instead with feeling.

“Well put.” Winston told him. He squinted all of a sudden and pushed himself onto all fours. He rushed past McCree, and McCree had to take a few fumbling steps to regain his balance. He followed after Winston to where he stood right at the edge before the drop off, his hand cupped over his face to see past the glare of the sun. 

“I think that’s Lena!” He told him excitedly, and Jesse was a great marksman, but all he could see in the distance was a speck that could be anything from the Orca to a stray seagull. 

He didn’t say anything, though. He let Winston make him a promise to get the rest of his report after he saw to the safe arrival of the rest of his agents, and Jesse gave him a playful salute when he charged off into the base. But Jesse stayed outside, eyes on that dot in between the heavy clouds.

If Winston was right, Angela was only a few minutes away. Answers were only a few minutes away. 

_ Hanzo was only a few minutes away, _ his stomach reminded him helpfully when it decided to break out in a burst of happy butterflies. Which was true, but Angela took priority. 

Through the intercom, Winston made an announcement to clear the landing pad, and Jesse skirted the edge of the garden to join the rest of the team by the mouth of the warehouse. 

Fareeha roped him into a hug when she caught sight of him, and she lifted him off the ground just to make a point of how much weight he’d lost. He shrugged off her worry and smiled, glad to see her. Reinhardt began to pull his handheld from his pocket, promising pictures of Torby’s kids, but Torbjörn smacked his hand and told him to save it for the rec room. Bastion peeked out from behind a pile of crates, Ganymede twittered a three-note tune, and Jesse figured the missing three agents had their hands full somewhere inside the base. 

Their little group braced itself for the transport’s cold gust of wind when Lena brought the ship down to land. The pilot was the first off the ship. As soon as the walkway lowered she zipped in a streak of blue into Winston’s waiting embrace. She lit up when she saw McCree, and moaned about how he had just missed Emily coming to visit. 

“I dropped her off in London before going to pick up this lot.” She told him. “Oh, Jess, you should’ve been here! It was just her and me and Winnie, we could’ve used the company! She would’ve loved to see you!”

“Damn, I’m sorry I missed her.” Jesse’s apology was heartfelt, but he couldn’t help but divert his attention back to the transport to watch the agents that couldn’t distort time and space make their own slower exits. Lena giggled and turned to gush about her girlfriend to Fareeha, who didn’t pay her any more attention. She waited just like Jesse to see a sign of Angela’s blonde head. 

She finally emerged, dressed in a knit blue sweater beneath her usual white smock, weighed down by luggage. Reinhardt rushed over to relieve her of the bags. She smiled at him, and looked around to greet the rest of them. Her grin widened when she saw Fareeha waving enthusiastically, and she returned the wave with a curl of her fingers. 

“Fareeha! Jesse!” She called out cheerfully, then her eyes widened and she switched her tone to that of her profession. “Jesse! Have you been starving yourself? What is this? Oh, wait until I get my hands on a razor, I will-” 

“Hey Angie.” He smiled at her, just glad to see her. Angela stopped a few paces away and inquired over Fareeha’s trip to Canada. 

“I hope your visit with your father went well?” 

“It did.” Fareeha answered, her grin bright enough to contest the sun. “I’m glad you’re home safe, Angela.” 

Lena interrupted by yelling at Fareeha to help her carry some of her bags to the door, and Fareeha smiled apologetically at the two of them and excused herself for a minute. Angela stepped forward and quickly offered to help, but Jesse reached an arm out and wrapped it around her shoulders. 

“None o’ that now, you just got back. Let her do some of the work.” 

“No, I insist.” Angela patted his hand and pushed his arm off, then she swept her hands to the sides of her face and tucked her bangs behind her ears. Ah, childhood friends and buttons. Jesse could spot her nervous tells a mile away. She ducked her head to avoid his gaze, looked around his bulk, and brightened. 

“Winston!” She called out, and their commander made a questioning noise and altered his path to lumber over to them. 

“Angie…” Jesse muttered, but Angela latched onto the gorilla’s arm the moment Jesse opened his mouth.

“I have a possible mission for us, and I’m afraid it’s quite time-sensitive. Could we speak in private?” Angela asked him, and Jesse scowled. Winston looked between the two of them and frowned questioningly. 

“Uh… sure. Let’s… uh, go to the briefing room.” 

Angela gave him an apologetic smile and mouthed, “later!” at him. Jesse huffed, irked, and Fareeha came back. He felt a sharp elbow stab his side repeatedly and he smacked Fareeha’s arm. She stopped, but she turned a gleeful smirk on him when he looked over at her. She nodded her head at the transport.

“Look!” She said, voice pitched high with excitement. She pointed, just in case her nod hadn’t been enough to guide him.

“What?” He asked, and he turned his head to follow where her finger pointed. He saw Mei pressing the button on the Orca’s belly to fold in the walkway, and chatting amicably next to her was-

 

Oh.

Oh,  _ no way. _

 

“Your face, Jesse, oh my gods!” 

“Pinch me, Faree.” He breathed, and he cursed when she did as he asked and dug her nails in deep. “Ow! Fuck, you’ve got claws sharper than a cat!” He slapped her hand away and froze when his cry of pain caught Mei and Hanzo’s attention. Their conversation drew to a halt, and they both turned in tandem to look at him. 

And Mei looked well. Mei looked as healthy and plump and rosy cheeked as ever. He was real glad to see her sweet face, and she seemed to return the sentiment, because she grinned so wide at seeing him that her dimples showed. But next to her…

Hanzo was looking right back at him, with his left brow raised ever so slightly. His hip rested against the landing gear of the Orca, ankles crossed next to his travel bag, and on his face was the smuggest grin Jesse’d ever seen on him. 

It fit him, Jesse thought a little helplessly. The smirk fit him, the weird hooded jacket fit him, the sinfully tight and torn dark wash jeans fit him. The guitar case slung across his back made him look like someone far removed from the yakuza, or mercenary work.  _ He even had boots on. _

Jesse made a small, pathetic noise in the back of his throat, and then Fareeha was laughing, snorting guffaws mingled with more comments on the state of his face. Jesse aimed to kick her, but she danced out of reach and towards the last two off the transport. Jesse yelled at her, but cut it short when he saw Fareeha’s goal. She took Mei’s hand in hers and led her towards him, and of course Hanzo followed. 

Every step he took closer disclosed a new detail. The stickers and patches on his guitar strap, the thin streak of black drawn over his eyelids. The regal fan of grey just over his ears was gone. The hair on top of Hanzo’s undercut was drawn back into a stylistic topknot, and his scarf was nowhere in sight. His ears were pierced,  _ the bridge of his nose- _

Jesse’s thoughts were in a disarray, like the dust bowl during tornado season, and all he could do was look and try to visually drink his fill of the man he hadn’t seen in over a month. He no doubt looked a fool, because he saw Mei hide a giggle behind her hand. Then she took that hand and brought it behind Hanzo to push him forward. 

Hanzo made a little noise of annoyance, and Mei stuck her tongue out at him. Fareeha’s elbow once again made contact with Jesse’s side, prompting him to speak. 

“Hey there, sweetheart.” He said softly, but it didn’t feel like enough. He hastened to add a compliment, “You… You look-”

“You look terrible.” Hanzo said, finally close enough to take in his unkempt appearance. He eyed him and gave a little sniff, frowning at the bushy wildness of his beard and his general pallor. “Have you been eating? Do not tell me you’ve neglected your well being for the sake of the mission, Jesse.” 

Jesse chuckled at his blunt honesty. “Always a charmer, you. And there wasn’t a mission, at least not officially.” He lifted a hand to hover beside Hanzo’s neck and nodded to show his intention. “May I?” 

Hanzo huffed, exasperated, but tilted his head to lean it against McCree’s open palm. Jesse marveled at the softness of the short bristles on the shaved portion of his head, and Hanzo smiled at the touch. Mei and Fareeha called out that they’d see them inside, and then they were the last two left outside. 

Jesse let his fingers brush along Hanzo’s jawline, up to his cheekbone, then his brow. He took that constant strand of hair over his face and tucked it behind his ear. 

“I missed you, sweetheart.” 

Hanzo dropped his duffel and reached up to take Jesse’s hand into both of his own. He pressed a kiss to the skin over his knuckles and whispered his response. 

“I missed you as well.”  

“What’d you get up to in Japan?” 

Talk of work broke the spell. Hanzo groaned, dropped his hand, and rubbed at his temples. “I would prefer only to have to recount it once. Would you consider standing in during my report to Winston?”

Jesse nodded. Hanzo thanked him and together they started making their way into the base. Hanzo shot down Jesse’s offer to help him carry his bags in, and then asked, “Did you go back to your roots, as you said?” 

“Eh, some of them.” Jesse told him. 

“Did you find anything worthwhile?”

“You just missed my meetin’ with Winston, honey, and we have the same preferences.” Jesse said. Hanzo harrumphed, but let it rest. Walking through the base, they ran into Zenyatta and stopped to say hello, but only for a moment. They moved on and entered the main foyer of the Watchpoint, where the staircases branched off. Jesse made teasing conversation as they walked. 

“So the hair I get, and the piercings, and the jacket. But Hanzo, the pants?”  

“These are Genji’s.” Hanzo looked down at the denim on his legs, trying to find what was wrong with them. Jesse gave an incredulous laugh.

“Genji owns pants?” 

Hanzo’s lips quirked up a bit at the corners at Jesse’s quip, but he smothered the smile and went on.

“I went through his closet before leaving. Winston warned I would need a disguise and I didn’t feel there was a need to waste funds when Genji and I share the same si-”

Jesse looked up when he heard the rapid tap of Genji’s metal feet going down the stairs. 

“THOSE ARE MY PANTS! WHO SAID YOU COULD BORROW THEM!?”

“-size.” Hanzo finished, ignoring his brother’s arrival. They both stopped at the foot of the staircase.

“You rolled up the hem, darlin’.” Jesse observed as he stepped back to keep away from the cyborg barreling into the room. 

_ “Urusai.” _ Hanzo told him. Then he looked up towards his oncoming brother to call out his habitual greeting, but it phased into a warning when he saw Genji launch himself off the banister.  _ “Tadaima, Genji- Hora! Chouyaku shinai!” _ [29]

The duffel dropped, and Hanzo only had just enough time to yank the guitar case strap up and over his head and toss it aside before Genji came crashing into him from above. Jesse shuffled to avoid getting whacked by any of the flailing limbs on the floor. Hanzo wrestled his little brother off from on top of him and tried to scold him for recklessness, but his harsh tone got drowned in Genji’s jubilance.

“Okaeri!” He yelled into Hanzo’s face, and Jesse couldn’t see Genji’s face through the mask, but the beat of silence following his screeched welcome meant he hadn’t known about Hanzo’s new look either. 

“Holy shit.” He said. He let Hanzo push him off his lap and scrambled to his feet to stare down at him. “Is this the return of rebellious Hanzo, or are you going to pin this as ‘an indulgence of childish fantasies’ too?”  

Jesse didn’t give Hanzo a chance to answer, but he did give him a hand to help him stand. As Hanzo straightened his clothes and picked up his luggage, Jesse turned to Genji.

“Rebellious Hanzo!? Return!? Genji, what’s the story here?” 

Hanzo held up a hand to quiet his brother and answered himself. “The story is we made quite the pair in college. Genji dyed his hair, did every drug imaginable, and threatened to fail all his classes until the last minute. Meanwhile I majored in math and physics instead of business.” He began to lead them up to the dorms. “It’s not very interesting.” 

“I still think your hair was horrendous. But Jesse, that’s not all of it. We took one music class and our father threatened to separate us, saying I was a bad influence.” Genji blew a raspberry and continued, “He did not approve of the persona assigned to the yakuza in Japan, and-”

“And Genji’s fondness for obscene hip-hop did not go over well.” Hanzo cut his brother off as they climbed the stairs, and the action was so brotherly that Jesse had to smile. They made it onto the landing and Mei poked her head out of her room and rushed to follow them down the hall and listen in. 

“Yeah, well neither did your  _ fondness _ for rap.” Genji playfully nudged his brother in the side. “But look at you now! Father would be so disappointed! This is great!” He perked up and began to jump excitedly, “Hanzo! I have a  _ sukajan _ somewhere! Let me go find it and you can finish the look!” 

Mei clapped her hands and gasped. 

“Oh!” She cried. “So it  _ is _ yours!”

The three men stopped in their tracks and looked at her. She snapped her fingers and pulled her phone from her bra and began swiping through it quickly. 

“I thought it was strange! You mean this jacket, right?” She asked and shoved her phone in their faces. On the screen was a bright video clip of neon strobes flashing through the waves of a smoke machine, with Lúcio standing in the middle of it behind a table topped with his soundboard and mixers. He wore an old-looking green bomber jacket embroidered with cherry blossoms and what could be seen of the tail end of a golden dragon. 

Jesse barked out a laugh, and then clapped a hand over his mouth when Genji sent him a murderous glare through his visor. Mei preened, and a devilish smile lit her face. Hanzo looked between Genji and the phone, confusion written stark over his features. 

Genji took the phone from Mei. Muttering in Japanese, he tapped out a comment below the posting of the video, hit send, then handed it back and silently dared any of them to say a word. Mei bit her lip to keep from having an outburst, Hanzo raised his eyebrows at all of them, and Jesse wondered where the fuck Genji kept all this clothing he apparently owned and never wore.   

Once they reached Jesse’s door, Hanzo stopped and looked to Jesse expectantly. Jesse obliged and promptly opened it for him. They kicked Genji out when he tried to follow them in, using their newfound blackmail advantage to make sure he left them undisturbed. Mei laughed in delight, and Hanzo shut the door just as Mei started frog-marching Genji back down the hall.

They stood by the door without speaking for half a minute. Jesse watched Hanzo take in the barely lived-in state of the room, no doubt appreciating the lack of dust and disarray. 

“I’ve just come back from a month long mission.” Hanzo broke the silence first, and Jesse broke the month apart in his head. A month was rounding down, and generously. He figured they’d been apart nearing on forty-six days. Forty-six days, twenty-fours hours to a day, so… one thousand one hundred and four hours. 

Hours, days. Months to years. Eight to five. Loneliness to companionship.  

Hanzo kept speaking, unaware of Jesse’s train of thought. “I haven’t seen you in just as long, and I have approximately half an hour before Winston calls me in for a debrief. What do you suggest I do?” He asked him, a smile just barely present on his lips.   

Jesse hummed, faking thoughtfulness. “Wanna take a nap?” 

Hanzo gave a low, throaty laugh, and he let his shoulders drop and relax.  

“That may be the best suggestion I’ve ever been given.”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once upon a time i had something that resembled an actual update schedule but those days are long gone. I can blame my brain’s insistence of creative equivalent exchange in that I can’t seem to have drawing capabilities concurrently with writing ones. I can blame my job or my recent loss of free time. Or I can pinpoint the truth of the matter: that writing is fuckin hard and i just ain’t been feelin it lately and it probably shows in the quality of this but damn. I mean, I’m trying. 
> 
> So thanks for reading! here’s my [tumblr](https://cantodelcolibri.tumblr.com/) if you wanna chat, here’s my [loss of free time](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_festival_\(Japan\)), and here’s the [song currently stuck in my head](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ)
> 
> Translations:  
> [1]But something tells me it was the other way around.  
> [2]How do you say it… it’s something about that damn sport…  
> [3]What do you want, cowboy?  
> [4]The stupid shit they use in learning programs, I swear-  
> [5]And what do you know about-  
> [6]Secondly, I don’t give a damn shit about you, Jesse McCree.  
> [7]You’re his son  
> [8]Come on, buddy. Tell me.  
> [9]Friends help friends and all that shit.  
> [10]What do you say? A soul for a soul. Wanna go halfsies?  
> [11]Yeah, sure. Half my soul. Plus a 15% tip.  
> [12]You know her, right? Can you make sure she makes it home safe?  
> [13]Oh shut up, will you?  
> [14]Stop fucking around, I’m serious!  
> [15]I’m tired of your excuses, Morrison! No, shut up! Don’t interrupt me-  
> [16]Get out, cowboy.  
> [17]Hey, don’t have a go at me! What did I do to you?  
> [18]I told you to shut up-  
> [19]Y’all talkin’ ‘bout me?..... I hope it’s about how handsome I am.  
> [20]You shut up too, asshole.  
> [21]Ye of little faith  
> [22]Don’t act stupid, son.  
> [23]Jesse, son, that’s enough. Sign it.  
> [24]you don’t have to do everything alone, dumbass  
> [25]That’s not fair!  
> [26]Welcome back, by the way.  
> [27]The shape of it.  
> [28]You’re a liar, Jesse James! Either that or an idiot.  
> [29]Shut up. ---- I’m home, Genji- Hey! No, don’t jump!  
> 


End file.
